Five Things that Never Happened to Lucifer Morningstar
by legendarytobes
Summary: Five AU snippets for the Lucifer Bingo prompt of "five things." All things that most assuredly didn't happen between Chloe Decker/Lucifer Morningstar.


**Five Things that Never Happened to Lucifer Morningstar**

_Devil in the Blue Dress_

Chloe couldn't stop rewatching the footage. The way Lucinda had stalked across the expanse of the office, the utter fury in the consultant's eyes as she'd flung a man easily twice her size through a plate glass window like it was nothing. Ty Huntley's burly agent, who had been a former star linebacker, himself, must have landed twenty feet from the wannabe consultant.

It wasn't possible.

It wasn't any more possible than the fact that Lucinda had clearly been out with Delilah on the street when the drive by happened and yet hadn't had a scratch on her. It wasn't possible that she'd been one place during the imminent paparazzo standoff and then half a second later, she'd been behind Chloe, whispering in her ear with that annoyingly low alto of hers.

The first two times, she'd tried to ignore the weirdness-the mojo that got everyone else _but _her to confess, the easy slips through handcuffs and out of locked cop cars, and even the seeming teleportation. Because none of it made a damn bit of sense, but there was no way a woman no bigger than Chloe was had thrashed a Superbowl champion without breaking stride.

What the fuck was any of this?

Sighing, she turned off her computer and shuffled to her bed. Tomorrow. She'd figure everything out tomorrow. Because something was very wrong with Lucinda Morningstar, and even if the other woman was trailing her around like the world's weirdest puppy from crime scene to crime scene, Chloe wanted nothing to do with her. Even if the club owner and lounge singer had saved her life with Jimmy Barnes, even then, something was deeply, truly wrong with Morningstar, and the further Chloe kept her away from both her own career and from Trixie, the better off they'd all be.

The last thing she expected as the nightmares from her terrible, conflicted sleep faded in the shower was to hear a noise coming from her kitchen, the sizzling of _something_ on the skillet and the slam of pans on the burners. Trixie wasn't allowed to go near the stove and wouldn't know how to cook even if she did. Dan wasn't supposed to reach the house to pick their daughter up for another thirty minutes and, even if he was early, Dan had never been good at breakfast. He'd always been a steak on the grill or taco night special kind of husband.

Tensing, Chloe turned off the water and slipped from the shower. Wrapping her towel as tightly around her as she could, Chloe grabbed her side piece and slipped down the stairs. The thudding of various pots and pans grew louder until she reached the floor below. Till she came face to back with the intruder in her apartment.

"Freeze!" She moved her arms into position to pin the intruder in place, and then cursed when her damn towel fell to the floor at her feet.

Lucinda turned around and pushed her long, dark curls over one shoulder. She smirked back at Chloe and licked her lips. Embarrassed, Chloe lunged for her towel and pulled it back up into place, all the while ignoring the warmth spreading through her belly. Any of _that_ was a long time ago, and after probably too many beers on the remote set of _Hot Tub Time Machine_ with her co-star Ashley. She was not like that, not really, and she certainly wasn't developing any attraction at all for the strange, annoying woman-no intruder-who was in her damn home.

"Well, detective," the other woman purred, even as she smoothly moved the omelet (?) off the burner and turned off the stove. "If you'd wanted to seduce me, you didn't need to try so hard."

"Shut up, Lucinda. What the hell are you even doing here?"

The other woman offered her a Mona Lisa smile, as enigmatic as the rest of her whole schtick, and gestured to the stove. "I thought we'd work on getting to know each other better, off of a case."

"We don't work together. You inserted yourself into a case while smoking the evidence and then called me like a concierge to clear a friend of yours."

"And Ty was innocent, detective, so I'd say we make a smashing team!"

"You broke into my house."

"Technically," Lucinda continued. "I knicked the keys from your pocket and had a copy made. It wasn't like a jimmied the lock. It would be uncouth."

"You what?"

Lucinda shrugged as if this weren't a batshit conversation, though to be fair, it was always a batshit conversation with Lucinda. Then she reached for the tie on her blue silk wrap dress and undid it before Chloe could object. It left the other woman standing before her in nothing more than a bra-and-panty set that probably cost more than most of Chloe's standard work wardrobe.

"However, I can see why you're furious with me. You unexpectedly exposed yourself to me, and that leads to an uneven keel. I've always been a big fan of turnabout being fair play, after all."

Chloe ignored any other flickers of lust in her stupid belly and surged forward. Placing a hand on Lucinda's shoulder. "Stop, okay, this is completely insane and inappropriate. You put your dress back on, go home, and leave me alone. I don't want eggs with you."

"Omelets with organic goat cheese and locally sourced herbs are hardly just eggs, detective," Lucinda practically purred.

"You broke into my house and are half-naked in it!"

Lucinda pulled away and spun around for her. "Do you like what you see?"

Chloe rolled her eyes. Her child was going to be up any moment, if she wasn't already and she had absolutely zero way to explain Lucinda standing in her kitchen, even if without the near nudity part. But the anger surging through her soon turned to utter confusion and sympathy when she spied the large, jagged scars stretched painfully over Lucinda's shoulder blades. Confused, Chloe reached out for them. The other woman flinched and grew still when Chloe's fingers made contact with the scarred skin there.

"Don't." Lucinda said, her tone finally less than insufferably smug for once. Chloe didn't drop her hand yet, just let her forefinger trace the furrow of scars beneath it. "Please," Lucinda added, before pulling back and then slipping on her dress.

"What happened there?"

Lucinda shrugged and that cat-who-ate-the-canary grin was back on her lips. Yet, the lascivious expression no longer met her lovely, dark eyes. "A gift from my father."

"Lucinda, your father cut your shoulders like this?"

Domestic cases had often been assigned to her as a uni. The other women in the force, the beat cops, got shifted that way. And they'd always hit her hard. Even now as a full detective, she always felt a special impetus when the victim was a woman or a child, when she could so easily see herself or Trixie in their places. But she didn't understand the behavior. She'd seen it, processed it, and fought against it, but she'd never lived it. Her father had been the best man she'd ever known, taken far too early from her and her mother. The very thought that a father could-had-done this to a child turned her stomach.

"I'm sorry."

Lucinda shrugged but didn't turn back to the food. "There's nothing to be sorry about. He didn't do it. I had Maze do it when I decided to finally stay in Los Angeles."

"What?"

She nodded. "I didn't want my wings…so, I suppose in a way my father is the root of them. I had Maze cut my wings off and the scars were a side effect of losing them, of course."

Lucinda was odd and clearly inhumanly strong, and Chloe hadn't quite figured any of that out yet. Wasn't even sure she wanted to, but this was the first time even with all her Lucinda-ness, that Chloe thought the woman before her might actually be fully delusional. It was L.A. after all and method actors and cult gurus were a thing. But Lucinda really believed she'd had wings, really was completely serious insisting she'd had them cut off.

"I don't understand," Chloe said, her voice small and quiet, trying to make herself as comforting as possible as she would have as a uni on a domestic abuse case. She wanted Lucinda to open up to her, not to return to the bravado.

"What's there to understand, detective?" Her words were casual enough, but Lucinda's tone was tight and her eyes darkened with suspicion.

Chloe frowned back at her. "Your back's mutilated. I can't imagine how painful that must have been. I…it wasn't because you cut off your wings. Seriously, what happened? How can I help?"

Lucinda stilled and there was something feral and cold in her eyes. It was only there for a moment, but it had been there. "I'm telling the truth. I always tell it. My father wanted to control me, to keep me on _his_ leash, and I had Maze free me from such a cumbersome burden." She shrugged. "Dearie me." Lucinda turned back to the eggs on the stove. "I've let them grow cold. We can start again. The strong foundation for a good day is a hearty breakfast after all."

Chloe set a hand on Lucinda's shoulder again, careful to avoid any area where the scars encroached. "Don't," she said, echoing Lucinda's own words back to her.

"Don't what, detective?"

"It's okay if your father…it's not okay. It's fucking wrong and despicable if he hurt you, but you don't have to shrug it off as if it were nothing because it's not."

Lucinda glanced at her over one shoulder and sighed. "It was eons ago, and I've worked hard to forget it. Better to reign in Hell and all that right? Now, let's get some protein in you and stop some bad guys. It'll make us both feel better."

She nodded and stepped back to the stairs. After everything, the least she could do was let Lucinda-her skewed sense of boundaries aside-finish cooking and eat with her. Besides, she only had some Cocoa Puffs in the pantry and something with a nutritional value would be nice for Trixie. And yet…the incident from yesterday flashed through her mind yet again.

"You're not a liar."

"Point of pride," she chirped.

Chloe sighed. "But you're not telling me everything either. I saw what you did to Ty's agent. I couldn't have done it. I don't know a single woman alive who could have even come close. The wings you keep talking about…what is up with you?"

She turned and gave that damn Mona Lisa smile, which was seriously starting to short circuit Chloe's brain and other regions. Damn her. "I told you already. I'm the devil. Now, do you want toast or muffins with the omelet?"

_One that You Can't Refuse_

By now, everyone in Los Angeles knew who Lucifer Morningstar was. He gave favors. It was what he did, what he lived for. And they weren't penny ante shit either. He could get someone out of jail even when arraigned on the most convincing murder charges. He could take the average waitress in a two-bit diner and make her an A-list actress in under a year. He could bring your enemies to their knees, at least that's what she'd heard when she started researching the biggest urban legend in the City of Angels and found that he actually existed and that the favor business was booming.

What Chloe Decker, former detective and even more former teen actress, hadn't expected was to find him lording over his empire in an overpriced lounge and bar in one of the oldest art deco buildings in the city. Or to meet him the first time as he sat perched at his piano crooning out a Sinatra tune. He was very good, would have given Old Blue Eyes even a run for his money.

But the Godfather, he wasn't. For one, she seriously doubted that Michael Corleone would have worn quite as much guyliner.

She sidled up to the bar and ordered a whiskey, neat. The woman who served her was as gorgeous as any other actress or model wannabe in L.A., but there was something off about her. While serviceable if not a bit gruff with customers, there was something else about the black woman behind the bar. She moved with a fluidity and grace that didn't even indicate she'd been a dancer. Chloe'd been in those types of classes for years at her mother's insistence. After all, what was the point of acting if you couldn't be a triple threat (although Penelope Decker was barely an actress on her good days and song and dance eluded her). No, there was something else about the bar tender from the tight hold of her posture to the way her eyes constantly scanned the dark corners of Lux for danger.

Maybe she'd been a cop once too.

At either rate, she acted far more like a bodyguard than the hired help.

"You know the boss well?" Chloe asked.

The bartender nodded. "I followed Lucifer through the gates of Hell and have served as his most skilled torturer for millennia. There is nowhere my lord would go that I wouldn't follow."

"Oh right," Chloe said, trying to keep her tone light even if the bartender's monologue freaked her out. She knew acting when she saw it, had been in enough auditions for that. The bartender wasn't playing a role no matter the theme at Lux. No, at best the woman was downright delusional. Didn't speak well of Morningstar either. "The whole 'he's the devil, thing.'"

The bartender leaned over the bar and grinned. "_He_ is the devil. Now, what are you really doing here?"

Chloe shrugged and offered her hand. The other woman refused to take it. "Chloe Decker, and I need a favor."

The bartender smirked. "Oh, he knows you. I'm Mazikeen, and I'll make the arrangements. Stay there, and in a few minutes, he'll have you up at his penthouse."

"I don't…I'm not looking for that kind of favor." She might be injured and out on permanent medical leave with no career to speak of, but she was still Chloe Decker, the woman her father had raised. She was desperate but she'd never whore herself out to anyone, let alone a crazy club owner, for a favor. No matter how badly she wanted it. "I heard he called on you later to pay back."

Mazikeen nodded. "He does, and that's never the price. Boss likes free will. Coercion isn't his kink." She shrugged. "Pity, you weren't seeking me out. I do like to make people scream. Girl like you, wound tight as you are, I'd love to hear you shout my name, Decker."

Chloe swallowed her drink in one, burning draught. "I just want to talk to your boss."

"Fine, then I'll fetch him. Offer still stands, Decker. You ever need a release…well, I'm no slouch in the sack myself."

Chloe frowned and nodded toward the piano in the center of the club. "Just Morningstar."

Mazikeen pouted a bit. "I'm far more fun."

Somehow, Chloe doubted that, especially with how, even now, Mazikeen tromped across the floor of the club like a warrior on a mission. After a few more songs in the set, Lucifer finished and pulled on his jacket. Then he strode to the elevator at the far end of the floor. The bartender was back behind the bar and whistled at Chloe.

"Follow him. He'll hold the elevator for you."

Chloe didn't have to be told twice. She strode quickly through the crowd and joined the Lucifer on the elevator. Only once it had shut behind them both, sealing off the noise of the crowd and the DJ, did she realize the reality-the gravity-of the situation. She, Chloe Decker, a formerly decorated detective and now a broken down and just utterly broken woman living on her mother's couch was about to ask the so-called devil for a favor.

He smiled down pleasantly at her, and she could see why the other part of his reputation was probably earned. After all her research on him had taught her two things: he could get you anything you wanted, no matter the legality of it, and he was the best lay in the city. She had never been interested in the second thing. Until now. Until she was standing next to him in a confined space and had the scent of him both a cologne that had to cost more than her monthly grocery allowance by the ounce and his own musk tickled her nose. Not with the way the dim glow of the elevator teased over his Patrician features, making his chin and nose even more strongly defined.

Oh there was very much a reason Lux was packed every night, and it probably had very little to do with Lucifer's talent as a performer. Maybe even less to do with the favors.

"See something you like?" He asked.

She swallowed hard and forced herself not to cross one leg over the other. Oh, she hadn't counted on a voice like velvet barreling through any of her remaining restraint either. God, did her clit throb just from looking at him. Maybe…_no_. She wasn't a whore. She'd lost everything else, even Trixie. She wouldn't lose the scraps of dignity she'd cobbled back together.

She just needed his skills. Morningstar was a tool to be used. Nothing more.

"Mazikeen said you could help me," she said.

The elevator came to a stop then and the doors opened onto an expansively decorated and open penthouse. The view was amazing, and she could see the hills and the Hollywood sign clearly before she'd even stepped past the bar up there. However, oddly, it wasn't decorated the way she'd expected. Chloe had envisioned either something, okay again out of _The Godfather_, some office with dark wooden shelves and dim light. Or maybe something incredibly yuppie with clean lines and glass everything. Lucifer's apartment was neither of those things. Instead, it was lit up in a golden glow with soft leather furniture in the corner, an already roaring fire place in the corner (and what was with that in Los Angeles in the summer), and a huge library with wall-to-wall shelves that had to be twenty feet high. It was stuffed with volumes and first editions as far as the eye could see.

"This is some place."

"I've always fancied it," he replied. Taking off his jacket, he draped it over yet another piano and then leaned against his bar. "I confess that I know you." 

She frowned. "The press…everything about Palmetto was several years ago. I never took you for a newshound."

He flashed a grin that was equal parts seductive and feral, and it was the first cold, splash of water to her face since she'd gotten on the elevator with him. Morningstar was dangerous. No one had ever been killed because of him, not that she could trace. She never would have sought out that kind of favor, which was why he alone was who she'd sought out among the seedier element of L.A. But there was something _off_ about him, and she needed to keep her wits about her and tread carefully all the same.

"No, but I may recall a bit of that business now that you mention it, Chloe. That nasty business about the French weapons dealer and the cop left in a coma for over a year." His eyes widened. "_You're_ the cop."

She sighed and tugged off her jacket as best she could. Even two years after she'd woken up and with daily physical therapy, it was hard to do that. Lucifer surged forward and offered to help her, but she refused. People meant well, but she didn't even let her mother help her unless she really needed it. She'd been a damn good detective, and even if her right arm didn't really work any longer, well, she didn't need pity. Not from some club owner, not from the hottest ride in L.A. in more ways than one.

Finally, she was able to wrench it off and let it pool at her feet on the floor. She'd worn the thin, spaghetti-strapped top deliberately. It showed the scars she carried easily. The three bullet wounds in her shoulder and the one in a collar bone. Only a miracle and the best in modern science had kept her alive after she'd been shot tailing Malcolm. It hadn't left much of her, but she was at least still breathing. On her long, lonely days, she told herself that was enough.

When she had her two weekends a month with Trixie, it meant _everything_.

"You have my condolences," Morningstar replied, and while there had been a playfulness in his words before, an overture of seduction, that was gone now. She was far from surprised. Dating wasn't really something she did anymore.

Christ, who would even want to?

"I lived, sort of," she admitted. "But the crooked cop who got me…he had friends in all the right places. Bastard's a lieutenant now, and it's so wrong." She paced before him, waving her left arm wildly beside her. She knew how unbalanced that whole habit was while her right laid like a dead anchor at her side, but it was as it was. "He shouldn't be there."

Morningstar nodded and handed her a drink. "I've a feeling you need more of this."

"Maybe," she said, taking a sip, steadying her nerves. "And it's so much worse."

"I suspected."

"The cop working with him on his take was his partner."

"Following."

"My ex. My goddamn ex-husband is the other most crooked cop at my old precinct and the two of them took advantage of my shooting in every way possible. Malcolm twisted the facts of the case and while I kept my pension-thank God."

Morningstar glared at her. "Chloe, His name has no place here. It never will, but please continue."

She nodded. "Right, that devil thing, my bad. Anyway, he found a way to maneuver himself to the promotion he always wanted while kicking my ass out the door. Dan, well, I can't really…" she sighed. "I don't have much money, moved back in with my mother who travels a lot for work, and it's hard most days to take care of me. The courts…I see my daughter twice a month and all week at Easter and two over the summer as long as my mom's not touring."

"She's in a theater troupe?"

Chloe rolled her eyes. In for a penny, in for a pound. "She's the Penelope Decker. I mean, cheesy, terrible 80s sci-fi and horror flicks but she does the convention circuit a lot. Keeps her busy."

Morningstar's eyes lit up in barely contained glee. "That Decker. Oh, here I was thinking I was only honored by the presence of the most attractive teen comedy star who'd ever come down the pike. Phoebe Cates had nothing on you, my dear."

Chloe froze and felt the fight finally give out of her. That was it. She was almost forty years old and the sum of her life was a daughter she never saw enough, an ex who'd betrayed her, living on her mom's sofa, and one dumb scene in a movie she never should have signed the contract for in the first place. Dear God, if her father could see her now…he'd be so disappointed.

"What?" she finally coughed out.

He shrugged and finished his own drink. "That's where I know you from. I've always enjoyed your mother's films, the one where she's the mother of the antichrist was quite quaint."

"Uh, sure." Chloe said, not sure how to take that.

"But you, Chloe, were really something special."

Operative word: _were_. She swallowed hard and held her chin up high. "Do not finish the rest of that sentence by telling me how many times you've masturbated to _Hot Tub High School_."

Unfortunately, even if Morningstar had said that, it would be far from the first time she heard it. Once, a dad from Trixie's kindergarten class literally told her that at a beginning of the year family picnic. It had taken Dan (the ass) talking her down to keep her from shooting the bastard.

Morningstar mimed zipping his lips but still gave her a wink. Right, so much for not whoring herself out. Like Chloe ever had a choice about having dignity. She'd lost that at nineteen and at her mother's own urging. Role of a lifetime, her ass.

"I won't mention that again. However, you've held up remarkably well. You're still quite fetching."

Chloe let out a long, slow breath. "I know I'm not, but it's oddly sweet you're flattering me. I'm the one asking the favor."

Morningstar shook his head and stalked over to her with all the fluid movement of a lion hunting prey on the plains. He came to rest just a few inches from her, towering over her slight frame. "I never lie, and I wouldn't now. You're a gorgeous woman, Chloe, and whatever that bastard Malcolm did to you would never have changed that."

"Oh, I promise you it did. I…I want revenge. I want Malcolm out on his ass, exposed for the monster he is, and I want Dan taken down with him." She forced her voice not to break at that last part. "I want my daughter with me all the time, just like it used to be. Trixie's the one thing I've ever done right, and she doesn't deserve to be raised by a rat like Dan. Can you help me? Will you?"

The man-the so-called devil and everyone had a persona in Los Angeles after all-stroked the stubble on his chin. Even that was artfully messed up, so perfectly presented and trimmed. It made her mouth water. "You know how this works, do you not?"

She nodded. "Mazikeen…she implied it's not some weird sex thing, and my research confirms that mostly."

He laughed, a low throaty chuckle that went straight to her clit again. Damn him. "I assure you, Chloe, the women and men and everyone who share my bed come because they want to. I have no interest in a coerced party. It would be wrong and beneath me."

"Good." It was more than most of L.A. did. Her mother had never said things outright, but Chloe feared there'd been casting couch sessions in her mom's past.

"But the deals have certain rules, nevertheless. I do not kill people. I will not orchestrate anything that could result in the death of a human. It's both abhorrent to me, and it's out of my hands, rules even I must follow."

"I don't want them dead. I want the out of the force because they hurt people every day and let the criminals go free."

"Understood. Good, I've turned down more than one party who expected me to be bloody vengeance and I am far from that."

"Alright, what will I owe you if it's not…" She blushed before she continued. "…if it's not sexual?"

"An I.O.U. If I fix your problems: Malcolm and Dan exposed, disgraced, and your daughter returned to you full time, then I can collect on my debt with you at any time I please. Whatever I ask of you, you will render me, and it will not be something against your free will, nothing untoward beneath the sheets, but it will cost you and you will repay it in full."

"Would you ask me to kill someone?"

He rolled his eyes theatrically. "Did I not just establish the rules? No sex and no murder will be required from you, not now and not ever. I know the reputation that humans have assigned me, Chloe, but I'm hardly that kind of monster. I don't pretend to be a good man-or a man at all for that matter-but I don't hurt people like that. I _won't_. However, a deal must be a true deal." He leaned lower and his voice took on a low rumble that, instead of sounding seductive, made her knees shake. "These are serious stakes, my dear. No one welches on the devil. _No one_. So please do not ask for a favor you plan to renege on."

Chloe shook her head. "I won't. You know what I want, and when you come knocking on my door for the favor back-not that an out of work, on disability cop with no prospects has much to offer you in return-but I'll still repay it. I just want my daughter home. Please."

Morningstar nodded thoughtfully. "Never cared for children, m'self. They're filthy little miscreants, but I can see how much her loss aggrieves you. I will take you up on this offer, and I will get you what you want."

"And then I owe you the blank check?"

He nodded and surprised her by reaching out to stroke her cheek, long pianist fingers tickling over her beauty mark. "Yes, but, honestly, I don't think the price I'll ask in return will be exceptionally high."

She barked out a laugh, trying to find equilibrium in that moment. "Maybe I can get you Mom's autograph. Who wouldn't want the John Hancock of _The Vampire Queen_?"

He smiled genuinely then, a boyish grin that made him seem much younger and more vulnerable than she'd have expected. "Tempting, but I'll think of something. Don't worry, I may not want a child but I wouldn't leave an innocent in the hands of wolves, either. It's against my principles."

"The devil has principles?" she asked, taking a step from him and hating herself for losing contact with him.

He stiffened at that. "Unlike my Father, I have a sense of honor, believe me."

"I do." She shrugged and bent down for her jacket.

Morningstar watched her and that uncertain boyishness was back about him. "May I help? I presumed last time, but I don't wish to be rude, either."

She shook her head. "I can manage. I like it this way."

He grinned, bright teeth flashing back at her. "I respect independence. Always craved it myself. It's how I got to the City of Angels too." 

After long, fumbling moments, Chloe got her jacket back on. Morningstar was watching her with an implacable expression in his eyes. Thank Go…whoever that it wasn't more well-meaning pity. Chloe grew fucking sick of that.

"See, good as new," she replied. "Do I…do we plan everything out now? Do I need to come back?"

He shrugged, long arms splaying out beside him. "Typically, I do this alone. I go through my ledgers to see who already owes me and start from there. I'm more than capable of delivering what you ask without seeing you again."

"Great, that's good."

"But…"

"But?"

"I'd love to see you more often, Chloe. I…there's something about you that's incredibly compelling."

"I doubt that." She couldn't keep the bitterness out of her voice. No one had found her anything resembling interesting since Malcolm had almost killed her. Surely the erstwhile crown prince of the city didn't see anything in her. Couldn't.

He frowned down at her, as if figuring out the secrets of a Rubik's cube. "Tell me, Chloe, what is it you truly desire?"

She quirked an eyebrow at him. This she'd heard about too. That the wannabe godfather of L.A. had this parlor trick. He was some kind of amateur hypnotist (because of course he was since the "he's really the devil so he's using magic on people" wasn't an actual option). People had whispered far and wide about his ability to get anyone to confess to anything.

Honestly, Chloe thought it would be a bigger deal. All it felt like was really cheesy, like some ploy out of one of her mom's dumber movies.

"I already told you about the favor I wanted. That's it."

Morningstar furrowed his brow in confusion. "No, that's what you need of me. I want to know your deepest desire." He let his voice drop into a lower register, and it was seductive, sure, but it didn't make her want to confess everything she'd ever done either. As the rumor went. "Tell me, Chloe Decker, what is it your truly desire?"

"That's private, Morningstar, and I'd never tell you that."

He stood up and blinked wildly at her. "You didn't tell me."

"Um, no shit."

"No, you don't understand. Everyone _always_ tells me."

"You're not as charming as you think." 

He was still frowning at her, but he fell back into rhythm easily enough, even if the mirth didn't extend to his eyes. "Oh but I am. Still, how curious. Did my Father send you?"

"I don't know him."

"Well, everyone knows of Him."

"Right he's God because you're the devil," she said.

Jesus, had she fallen low.

The only hope she had now that the courts had failed her was one probably insane club owner of dubious legal standing. Man, she was probably fucked and not in the good way. Hadn't been _that_ in almost five years, considering all the tension in her and Dan's marriage before her shooting.

"I am." He smiled at her, and it was genuine, not seductive. "Come back on Friday around three. I'd like to work with you on this together, get your input. I think we'd make a good partnership, Chloe. That is, of course, assuming you don't have other plans."

She snorted. "Well, I was going to sit on the sofa and watch the Game Show Network, but you drive a hard bargain." Shaking her head, she turned on her heels and headed back to the elevator. Lucifer Morningstar had been as pleasant and charming as his reputation indicated he was. Hell, he'd been downright delicious and surprisingly kind. More than she deserved. "Until Friday."

The elevator dinged open before Morningstar spoke again:

"Miss Decker?"

"Huh?"

"I don't know what possessed that douche you were married to to betray you as he did, but it was surely his mistake. I've lived a very long time and met so very many people. You, by far, are the most intriguing woman I've ever met."

It was hard to swallow then, and she couldn't help but scowl back at him as she slid into the elevator. "Don't."

"Don't what?"

"Lie." 

"Never do, darling."

"I just…Friday," she said, glad when the doors slid closed in front of her.

There was no need for Mr. Morningstar to have said that, no need for that extra bit of flattery and white lies. She was Chloe Decker, failed teenage dream and washed up cop. Chloe Decker, who even ow felt like she hadn't quite woken up from her coma, like maybe she'd secretly died and ended up trapped in Hell. There was nothing intriguing about her.

She leaned against the cool metal of the elevator and cradled her arm.

No, nothing intriguing anymore.

_What to Expect When You Get Back from Rome_

Chloe hadn't wanted to come home to the States.

She'd had to, of course, because even though she'd had tons of medical leave after being shot (bullet proof vest or not) and spent the summer touring around Europe and roughly following the path of her mother's sci-fi convention circuits, it was nearing Labor Day, and Trixie needed to return to school. Dan still lived and worked in Los Angeles. Chloe could do should she decide to return to work after her medical leave, but she wasn't sure that was what she wanted, not anymore. Between Palmetto, Pierce's betrayal—and how had she dated a criminal mastermind and not known it-and Lucifer being the _actual fucking devil_, Chloe wasn't sure she could stand being on the force anymore.

All she'd done was pick the wrong men, fallen over and over for those working the job with her, and then failed to notice the huge things under her nose. If she were any type of a cop, she'd have figured out Dan was gaslighting her about Palmetto, that Pierce was the actual Sinnerman, and that her partner with the bizarre strength who'd come back from a bullet wound to the gut without a scratch was the actual Prince of Darkness.

She was 0 for 3 and had to be the absolute shittiest detective in the world.

But Dan was still in L.A., and their divorce settlement had them splitting joint custody. She couldn't hide in Rome forever, even if she and Trixie had peeled off from following her mother around over six weeks ago to spend time there. Her daughter loved the gelato and poking around the Roman ruins. She'd found an odd sense of peace at the Vatican, deeply immersed in the library archives, trying to make sense as a lifelong atheist vaguely raised with dollops of her mother's forays into New Age crap of the fact that it was _all real_.

Heaven and Hell, demons and angels. God, like _the _God. They all existed, and Lucifer was Satan. She'd seen.

It was the only thing she couldn't unsee. Back at the hotel they'd rented, and she was so glad, she and Trixie had separate bedrooms in their villa. Every night, she tossed and turned past three a.m. and woke by nine at most gasping for air and shaking under her covers. Because that face, that horribly scarred and burned face…it was _his_.

And it was so surely Lucifer's.

The angles of it, the set of his cheekbones and the strong lines of his nose. Even with the skin fucking burned away, it was his face. They were far from his eyes though, that mix of blackened sclera and irises that burned like a funeral pyre. They were demonic and everything the soft, brown of the eyes she'd known had never been. Was that part of some game too? Had he set this all up? Picked an image to project until for whatever reason he just couldn't anymore. Had killing Marcus forced the disguise away? Did he still look like that? Did it matter if he could just plaster on a different face for her, a _human_ one?

She'd _seen_.

He was Satan, the Prince of Lies and the Prince of Darkness. The most famous Fallen Angel, and the bad guy of every damn myth, legend, and story about good and evil since before humans knew how to write. Just what the actual fuck?

Was this some almost three-year-long ruse to steal her soul? Why even bother for such a nobody like her?

And he'd almost won, hadn't he? The night before the raid on the loft before the horrific early morning finding and working the case over poor Charlotte Richards's body, they had made love. She couldn't call it anything else. She'd kissed him after so long on Forest Clay's deck, and then he'd taken her back to the penthouse. She'd spent the night in his arms, promising him that things would only change from the better after this, that he wasn't the monster he kept insisting he was under his ever crazier and more deluded metaphors.

That she loved him.

And he'd promised her just as much.

But Prince of Lies, right?

She'd had sex with Satan. Okay, more than once too, more like four times that night and maybe his stamina should have been a huge honking clue. God, the first month she'd spent on the road in England—and of course her mom's first set of stops would be a May dragged out through a country that _sounded _like him even if he clearly was a fuck ton older than Great Britain-Chloe'd freaked out every night. She'd waited for her period to come and been relieved when it had.

Because it had been one of those nights and so very emotional, and she'd just given in without a care. Without protection.

But at least the absolute worst fucking thing hadn't happened, and she wasn't carrying the antichrist.

She'd be a babbling mess in a padded cell just like Jimmy Barnes if that had happened. Fuck, was that what he'd wanted? Because that seemed so not like Lucifer and only because at best Trixie baffled him and, at worst, he resented most kids in general for their messiness. And who knew the Devil, as in capital D, was so prissy and image-obsessed?

Just too many things, but Trixie started school in a week, and she had until October to sit down with the board at the precinct and decide to continue her career there (all the evidence on the Sinnerman that had been unearthed from Charlotte's leads had more than cleared her and Lucifer both for duty again). She just wasn't sure, but she couldn't stay in Rome any longer.

And now, in the last couple weeks since Father Kinley had come to her, told her about his work in secret with other exorcists, it no longer felt peaceful or safe. No longer felt like a port in the storm. He'd shoved the vial at her in their final meeting, and she'd agreed to take it and at least _think_ over what the priest wanted. All the horrible clippings and diaries and ancient journals he'd showed her seemed superficially to support Lucifer was as evil as his reputation always said he was, but she'd been a cop a very long time, and she knew circumstantial cases.

Damn it, she had to go home and see him. Had to understand his side, and then she could determine what to do with the vial in her purse. If he was here to bring on the Apocalypse (which he was really going about it in a Rube Goldberg way if he had opted to do that via night club sex, piano singing, and solving murders almost weekly in L.A.), she had to stop that.

If she'd never let a murderer off the hook before, how could she let the literal Beast of Revelation walk around free if he were going to end everything?

Her hands shook even as she opened the door to her apartment. Trixie had been picked up at the airport by Dan, who'd missed her terribly over the almost four months they'd been gone. She'd hugged Dan tightly too, apologized about missing the funeral for Charlotte, and promised him they'd get a drink and he could tell her anything he needed to get off the chest. She'd had her own fears and grief to work through-things that Dan could never understand-but she was back now, and she could be the friend he needed to deal with Charlotte's loss.

His bloodshot eyes and growing beard told her that he'd needed that badly.

But now she was home in every sense of the word and wishing she could still be on the run from her life. Being in the United States, let alone back in her own place in Los Angeles, felt far too close to Lucifer. Speak of the devil, the moment she entered her home, she froze in place to see Maze sitting on the sofa. Huge, heavy iron manacles encircled her wrists and bound her tightly at the ankles as well.

Her first instinct was to rush to her roommate's side and help her. Soon after though, the scared, tiny instinctive part of her brain forced her to still at the doorway. Maze was no more Maze than Lucifer was Lucifer. Scratch that. They were _exactly_ as they'd always promised and swore they were. It wasn't just her friend and roommate who never did the damn dishes before her. It was _a demon_. Not even just any demon (and would she ever get used to the vertigo in her life?). No, Maze was Satan's right hand, usually his most loyal lieutenant, and the best torturer Hell had ever seen. She'd bragged about it enough.

Before, it had been unsettling enough as some fucked up shared delusion between Maze and Lucifer. Now, it was all true, and Maze had literally spent thousands of years tearing humans apart limb from limb.

"Decker, hey. Dan said your flight got in. I…" she lifted the manacles. "I know you know. I'm not a threat to you. I'd never hurt you, and I'm so sorry I spiraled before and made Trixie upset. I'd never make her sad, not on purpose, and I'd never hurt you."

Of all the reactions, Chloe didn't actually expect anger to be the one she leaned on. "You're a demon! Isn't that what you're built to do? You hurt people. _Lucifer_ hurts people. That's what you are. So you sit here in my apartment and lie again and promise you won't hurt me? You're the one who pushed me closer and closer to Marcus in the first place!"

"I was messed up. I…Linda's been working with me on how badly I got out of control last spring. I'm really sorry." Maze made a face on that last work, almost as if she tasted in on her tongue and was unused to its flavor. "Decker, I'm not going to hurt you."

"I don't know that. My daughter lives here half the time. She's nine years old and there's a demon sleeping down the hall." 

Maze inhaled sharply. "Trix should be so lucky. I'd never let _anything_ harm her. I'd protect her with my life the same way I protected Lucifer, mostly, all these years. The same way I'd give my life in an instant for Linda's baby or for…" she shut up then, slamming her mouth shut.

Chloe's eyes widened. Linda was what?

"She's pregnant? I kind of thought…" she trailed off, not sure how to delicately say that Linda was over fifty, and she hadn't thought it possible for her friend any longer.

Maze shrugged even under the heavy chains. "Amenadiel apparently packs a celestial wallop. She's expecting in about three months."

"I…wow." Chloe shook a little. "Amenadiel's an angel."

"Well, duh."

"I hadn't…in all this mess, I thought about Lucifer and you and his dad all the damn time. I couldn't stop, couldn't sleep, couldn't stop the nightmares…"

Maze nodded. "I expected that. His face…"

"He's Satan, don't even defend him. You both spent almost three years playing me for a complete idiot."

"We never lied, Decker. You chose not to believe us. You, Dan, Ellen…none of you ever believed a word out of our mouths. We didn't lie; you embraced denial."

Chloe slammed the door behind her and slammed her hands down on the island counter. "No, you _knew_ the difference too, especially Lucifer. You both knew that humans weren't going to accept things without proof, that we'd tie all ourselves up in knots thinking you were both crazy or that Lucifer was just that much of a method actor." That was clearly Ella's solution for it all. "You knew that without any damn proof, we'd never believe you."

"But we didn't lie," Maze replied as if it were that simple.

Maybe it was to Lucifer and Maze, to the devil and the demon, who had never seemed to really understand how grown adults were supposed to behave. Actually, that made a lot of sense now. They didn't know how to behave like normal human beings because they weren't.

"Out, please." Chloe shook her head. "I'm not an idiot. I saw the damage Lucifer did to the loft. He exploded a window somehow and tore through marble busts." Some part of her memory offered up the inexplicable collections of massive, bloodied feathers all over the loft. Wings. Jesus fucking Christ, he had wings, right? "I know I can't make you do shit, even if I had my gun."

Maze nodded again. "No, you can't." She stood then as if she weren't weighed down by pounds of iron and steel and snapped the locks from around her wrists and ankles as if they were tissue paper. To her, clearly they were. "Decker, I swear to you," and she kneeled then and brought her right fist to her heart. "I swear as a child of the Lilim that I would never hurt you and I'd die before I let any harm ever come to Trixie again. If I ever made her cry, I'd bring my own blade to my heart and keep pressing down until I was dust. You have nothing to fear from me."

Chloe shook her head, the steel still in her tone. "You're not human."

"Not the best thing to be. That warden who murdered your father was human. Marcus Pierce was technically Cain, first murderer, but he was still human. Malcolm too."

Chloe stilled at that. "But I know how to take that, to deal with it. I'm not made for infernal bullshit and angelic interference and the goddamn devil. I don't _want_ to deal with it. Maze, please, if you ever were my friend, you'd move out and give me all the space I need."

"And Trixie?"

"No, Maze. And if you bump into her when she's at Dan's desk and you're just dropping off bounties…until I say it's okay, you can't be near her. I don't want my daughter in Hell."

Maze stepped back like Chloe had actually managed to land a physical blow against her. "Trixie would never go there, not ever. I'd lock the damn gates and force Lucifer to too. She'd never…I wouldn't allow it. She's my other best friend besides Linda."

Chloe slammed her fist on the counter this time. "I don't want that! How could I possibly want that? What kind of mother does it make me that my daughter's usual favorite person in the world is Hell's best torturer? Do you not get how fucked up this is?"

"I'm still me. Lucifer's still mostly Lucifer."

She arched an eyebrow at her roomie, curiosity winning out over common sense as she spoke. "Mostly?"

Maze nodded. "I…he's changed since you've left."

Chloe narrowed her eyes at the demon. "Going more au naturale? Can't keep up the lies for people anymore? All red and hideous out at Lux or just for me?"

The demon flinched at that. "He's still him where it counts, always was, but _a lot_ has been going on since you left and he'd never seek you out to talk about it because Lucifer doesn't say things. He makes grand gestures in the complete dumbest direction or drinks himself into a stupor, and he can't even do that this time."

Again more curiosity poking at her. When did Lucifer _not_ drink? He even did that on cases from his flask. She'd thought of him sadly as a fairly functional alcoholic, but now that she knew he was the fucking Devil, Chloe figured he could drink battery acid and not feel it.

"I don't understand."

"After the first two months, he figured you'd never come back. He stopped going by the precinct for several reasons. Then, he shut down Lux. He's just there…brooding…but there's a lot of shit he needs to plan for, and he'd do a hell of a lot better if you were helping him with it."

"Why should I care?"

"Because you did once, and because we're not human but we still have feelings and maybe we both were scared and thought that you'd somehow get it if it ever came out." Maze shook her head. "I wanted to be wrong about you, Decker. I really did. I always told Linda you couldn't handle this…handle us…but I wanted to be fucking wrong."

"I…"

"Run away to Timbuktu for all I care, but Lucifer…I did him wrong, and I'm trying to fix it. Learn how to be human like you all want, right?" She laughed bitterly. "All I know is my friend-the being I've known for over six thousand years, the man I've served-is suffering, and you could fix that. At least hear him out. He's at Linda's. I'll get you the directions. Okay?"

Chloe frowned. "He's not at the penthouse?"

"Linda's pretty loaded herself. He's moved into her pool house for a while. I got the basement floor. She and Amenadiel are totally doing this weird co-parenting shuffle where he takes the guest room, but you can tell they'd bone more if they weren't in some messed up headspace."

"No Lux, no penthouse, no booze," she said, echoing what Maze had explained. None of that sounded like Lucifer. At all.

Then again, hadn't Kinley said that Lucifer would always adjust his approach, refine until he presented the best image, the one that would lure in prey the best? People didn't just start calling him the _Prince of Lies_ for no reason, right?

"I don't understand."

"Happens when you're on another continent." Maze set the piece of paper for Linda's address on the farthest corner of the counter from her, giving her space, and that was so un-Mazelike too. "That's the address. I'm going out for a few days on a bounty run. I didn't talk to you, understand? Lucifer can't know that I vouched for him. He'd get all puffed up about it and send you away cause I 'put you up to it.'" She shrugged. "Go or don't, Decker, but at least think about hearing him out. It's not even about you anymore."

Maze was gone after that, her bike peeling off soon after.

Seriously, Chloe had chosen the wrong profession. Being a psychiatrist to the most famous and neurotic of Beverly Hills (apparently the literal, actual devil among them) made bank. Linda's Spanish style villa had four floors, was situated overlooking an expansive and well kept up lawn and had a pool big enough to host swim meets in the back. Even the pool house was two stories and probably had three times the floor space of her apartment currently. Chloe should have gone to medical school. Then again, while the pool house was lovely and good-sized, it was far from Lucifer's taste. Hell, she knew for herself he had several estates in Southern California, a good-sized mansion overlooking Malibu among them. What was he doing here?

"This is so dumb. I shouldn't listen to a demon," she muttered to herself. "Trap written all over it."

But this was so unlike Lucifer…any incarnation she'd been familiar with, even the demon standing over her dead fiancé, the Beast who haunted her nightmares, that Chloe had to see for herself. Even if she left the LAPD, well, you could take the girl out of detective duty, but you couldn't take the detective instincts out of the girl.

She knocked on the door despite her better judgment. Maybe he wasn't even there, maybe Maze was confused or lying or on something. But after a few, agonizing moments where she half-expected the raw, red-faced monster from the loft to answer the door, Chloe received the most baffling surprise of her life. And how any of this topped the moment she found out that her partner was Satan-in every sense of the word, and she'd had sex with the devil more than once-was just a testament to how weird her life was.

But there stood Lucifer, his hair a mass of messy curls though with stubble still artfully maintained on a thankfully human face, in swim trunks and nothing else. And with a belly so prominent on his usually (almost painfully) lanky frame that she had to draw the most impossible, illogical, and batshit conclusion upon seeing it.

_No fucking way. Okay, so fucking way, because we did and what the actual Hell?_

Lucifer stilled and blinked at her. "You're not real, go away."

Chloe stood there, unable to figure out what to say, her jaw working uselessly at first. "I…um, Linda called?"

Lucifer crossed her arms over his chest which somehow just made the obvious rounding of his stomach even more apparent. "Did she now? I'll have to have a talk with her about that. Granted, our professional relationship was barely ever there, and less so now that she's all but officially my sister-in-law and mother of my nephew to be. But I haven't tried to matchmake well, much, between her and my idiot brother. I'd appreciate the same consideration. Is there no honor among pregnant persons anymore?"

That did it.

Chloe who'd been spiraling since she'd seen the loft, since she'd found out about heaven and hell and everything in between, had finally cracked. Her eyes rolled back in her head and she found herself crashing to the floor, only inhumanly strong arms cradling her from nowhere broke her fall.

She blinked awake in a pleasant living room on an overstuffed beige sofa and with a pink snuggie tossed over her. In the background some TV show as playing beside her, and it took her a few minutes to remember she'd come home from Rome just today, and that…

_Oh shit_.

Chloe struggled to a sitting position on the couch and looked across the room to find Lucifer sitting oddly as regally as he ever had in his own armchair at the penthouse in a large, leather chair with his feet swept up on an Ottoman. (_Okay, note to self, probably not best to ask, but does he have a throne? Is that a Hell thing?_) He was wearing a pair of slacks and a button down shirt now, but the bulge-that impossible, improbable thing-was still there, very visible under the light maroon Oxford.

"I'm not hallucinating, am I?"

He shrugged and sipped on a glass of milk, which was the weirdest fucking thing she'd almost ever seen Lucifer do. The loft still ranked too. The damn antichrist in his stomach was a championship, blue ribbon winner in the weird Olympics. "Nor am I. Didn't know you'd gotten back in, although I've not spoken with Daniel or Miss Lopez in some time." He sighed and rolled the glass delicately between his hands. "Well, Miss Lopez texts daily, dear thing, and I do respond, but we never speak about you. I keep it brief. She'd like to visit, but…" he let a hand stray to the swell of his abdomen. "…I'm far from discreet right now, and I've learned my lesson about humans mixing with divinity, haven't I?" He grimaced and set the milk down on a table then grabbed the remote. "Well, the formerly divine. Hardly that now, am I?"

She arched her neck and focused on the television screen. It took a few minutes to place the show, but she had to laugh a little, despite the utter insanity of her life now. "You're watching _Bones_ still?"

He shrugged and pouted like a five-year-old. "I like the show, reminded me quite a bit of you, and I've always been a glutton for punishment." Lucifer sighed and gripped the arms of the chair. "I confess, I may have rewatched the season where Bones ends up in a family way more than once of late."

Chloe wasn't even sure what the bigger elephant in the room was-the fact that she was sitting here in a fucking snuggie talking to the devil about bad Fox shows like nothing had happened or the more mind-blowing fact that she'd somehow knocked said devil up. "Am I going to Hell?"

The words fell out of her mouth before she even realized she'd been thinking them.

The effect was automatic. Lucifer clicked off the set and hunched in on himself. "No, detective, that is not a fate for you, and it was never intended to be. Neither you nor the urchin will ever darken my door. You're both too good for that, too pure. If you ever did commit a sin that mortal, I still wouldn't let you in." He sighed and ran a hand through his mop of curls. "You have a friend in the lowest of places, after all."

"Then what was any of this?" she asked, and, unlike with Maze, she wasn't angry. That had been burned out of her already, and maybe that was Maze's plan all along when she intercepted Chloe first. "Why me?"

"I don't understand the question?" he asked, quirking his head in that endearing way he had when he was honestly trying to figure out human things (and he'd never been kidding about that, fuck) beyond his comprehension.

"Me, you, _us_," she hissed. "You what? Needed some idiot woman to help you get the whole antichrist thing rolling. Like, okay, not religious here, Lucifer, but Dan is a huge fan of horror movies and I saw a few and, uh, you know that whole antichrist carrying thing is usually the woman's job." She shuddered, couldn't help it. "Not that I'd want to."

Lucifer stood then and walked with a surprising amount of grace despite his condition back to the kitchen. "Right then, I understand. It was all my mistake. I never should have assumed you could have civil. I know it's all my bloody fault, but now that we've seen each other, you've made your feelings more than clear, and I'm the butt of the joke, well, you can see yourself out, detective."

She didn't move from her seat. Honestly, with all the mindfucks on top of mindfucks, Chloe didn't trust herself to stand. "No, you don't get to be the wounded party. Not today. You lied to me. You lied every day to my face for almost three years. You spun a pretty story and you could have flashed your face for me at any goddamn moment. Any single one. But you had what? More fun watching me flounder? Seeing my heart break when you ran off with Candy or when you tried to show me your 'face' and then didn't. God, I almost married the Sinnerman, and you just watched. What the fuck, Lucifer?"

He sighed and leaned against the island. It made things worse than when he'd sat. The pregnancy was so much more obvious when he stood like that, and Chloe had helped create the antichrist. She was just not going to be able to process that any time ever.

"It's complicated."

"I have time now. You explain it to me."

He sighed. "At first, I was scared to tell you because I thought you'd react badly." He laughed bitterly and scrubbed at his chin. "Wherever would I get an idea like that from?"

"You fucked up, not me."

"Quite," he said, letting one hand splay out against his gut. "Then, I did try to tell you after everything on the pier with M…Charlotte Richards, but at the time I honestly could not summon my face."

She crossed her arms over her chest and glared at him. "The _real_ one."

Pain flashed across Lucifer's face for a moment, and she almost felt badly. Almost, but this face was an illusion. The full lips truly chapped and scarred. The smooth, pale skin really crimson and furrowed. And the eyes…

…nothing but demonic underneath.

"Yes, what you saw in the loft is how I am…at least I think so. I look that way in Hell, have since the Fall, and I always thought it was my Father's punishment. Then, I woke up kidnapped in the desert with my wings back, and I _couldn't_ make my devil face come out. I'll spare you the ins and outs of _how_ Amenadiel and I put things together, but we figured out that angels self-actualize."

"I don't know what that means." The best she could reckon, it seemed like some hippie concept her mom would have told her, like a pat of _The Secret_ and a tip for imagining her success before it happened.

"It means," Lucifer said, his grip on his… their…no, definitely _his_ child tightening. "That whatever our subconscious dreams up to do to us, our body will do. Amenadiel felt guilt over something that it's not my place to reveal, and he 'fell' for two years. He lost his wings and was mortal enough to get Linda pregnant. He's better now, grew his own wings back and flew dear Charlotte to heaven."

Chloe let out a breath, something clicking in her brain with all her heaven and hell fears that never had before. "That morning at the crime scene…you were being literal."

He smiled ruefully. "Always, detective. Charlotte's in heaven now, at peace and happy finally. Sometimes, Amenadiel pops up to see her still. I, of course, am not allowed."

"Oh," and she didn't know what else to say to that.

"I know that works on me too. I took my own face away, even though I didn't understand it at the time last year. I only had my angel wings then. In the loft, it all came back." He swallowed hard, Adam's apple bobbing in his long neck. His brown eyes cast away from her own. "I killed a human. Cain was a first-class psychotic and a right bastard, but he was still human. Curses don't change that. I broke the only rule my father has ever cared about amongst angels, and, well, I haven't been a real one in a long time, but I still felt…I deserved my punishment. So the devil face returned, and, of course, at the worst possible time."

"Do you still have it?"

"Yes, and I don't even know which is the real one and which isn't." He sighed. "I'm not sure I want to. Before you ask, I'm not possessing some bloke from Surrey or some rot like that. I forbade such a thing two thousand years ago amongst demons."

"That's uh something," she offered, still not really following higher thought.

Lucifer raked a hand through his hair a second time and now it stuck up all over. If this were any other situation, she'd have found it adorable. "I looked like this before the Fall. When I was an angel. The devil face was after, and I think I did it to myself and, honestly, I can't say I don't deserve it, after all I've done."

"But Cain was your first murder?"

"First human dead by my hand, yes," he replied, but it wasn't quite the wording she expected. Lucifer was slippery like that, and she didn't…it was all too much to prod now but she'd save a deeper question of how bloodied his hands were for later. Wait, was she going to give him a later?

Chloe shook her head a little and realized that, yes, she'd talk again with him, at least before she decided if she'd quit her job or if she'd start over in the corner of Los Angeles farthest away from him but still granting Trixie access to Dan.

"But I don't…I wasn't lying, but last year, showing you my wings would have felt like a lie. It was who I was. But we both know now I'm anything _but_ an angel." Sighing, he closed his eyes and his face flickered. It took no more than a moment for his other face, for the terrible scarred mess that had haunted her nightmares to assert itself. "Does this make the conversation worse or better?"

Chloe had flung herself against the back of the couch, her body rigid against the cushions and breathing shallow. She was a cop, had been shot in the line of duty, and faced the seediest underbelly of L.A. over and over. But this was…it was still terrifying to see, and somehow worse because it was Lucifer's voice, his sweet lilt coming from the face.

That small flicker again and brown eyes and smooth skin greeted her. Lucifer looked his actual age then, infinite sadness in ancient eyes. "Duly noted. I shall never do that again, should I be able to help it. In the loft, I didn't even know. I apologize for you having to see that."

"You never would have told me anything if not for that though, right?"

"I tried…I just…I wanted you to understand. After you wouldn't believe me about Cain, I desperately did." He shrugged. "None of that matters now. I suppose, detective, you've had your curiosity satisfied and will go on about your life trying to pretend you never met a monster."

"I slept with a monster. Repeatedly," she countered and then gestured to his baby. She would not-could not-think of it as something they'd made together. "I repeat: we literally did make _Rosemary's Baby_. Is that what you were after?"

Lucifer sighed but didn't leave his corner of the room. "I would never hurt you, do you understand that?"

"Too late."

"I meant that I will endeavor to never make you feel fear of me again. I will stay away from your life, was bloody well trying to do that now. I would never physically harm you, and I would never let anything touch your spawn."

"But it was a set-up, right? You just needed, uh, that?" she said, gesturing toward his stomach.

She regretted her words immediately. The way Lucifer flinched and hunched in on himself…she hadn't seen him that wounded or upset since he was screaming and half-delusional in the interrogation room following his weeks of not sleeping. She'd hurt him. Never once in their twisted, messed up, _broken_ relationship had she ever deliberately sought to wound him with her words.

See, that was what hanging with the devil brought out in you.

"Self-actualization strikes again. Believe me, with my track record, if I were normally capable of this, then it would have happened." He sighed and his voice was so quiet that it barely wafted across the expanse of the room to her. "I missed you."

"I don't understand," she replied, her tone cold even as she crossed her arms over her chest.

"I bloody well did this to myself. I missed you, tortured myself just dwelling on that one night we had, and I just…Linda and Amenadiel both speculate that I wanted to have even a piece of you still with me." Lucifer laughed, and it was the most hollow, broken sound she'd ever heard. "I suppose that's all I've left of you, am I right?"

Chloe was out of the sofa and halfway across the room toward him before she could stop herself. The instinct to comfort him so very strong, the rhythm between them in some ways as familiar and welcoming at is had ever been. She stilled as she passed his armchair. That was before, back when Lucifer Morningstar was just an eccentric-possibly delusional—club owner and manwhore (of all things). This was now when the Lord of the Flies had lied to her over and over again and made a fool of her. Now the Chloe knew she'd been used and betrayed.

It couldn't go back like it could that night on Forest Clay's balcony, could it?

Did she want that?

"I don't know." And that much of an answer surprised her. "I'm human. I'm a cop, I think. I'm a good person."

"The best," he answered. "I suppose that half the child is yours is a good thing." He chuckled bitterly again. "A miracle really. Dad knows it won't get anything useful from me, let alone good." 

She swallowed hard at that and tried not to shudder again. Mostly, she didn't want to hurt him, to see that defeat in his (not actual but still) face. It hadn't brought her satisfaction, just hurt her worse too. "I can't…I just…I'm not cut out for this. Why me? I'm just one, regular person and I can't be…this is all of human history, good and bad, fucking God here and _he's_ real."

Lucifer shook his head. "Dad is but he's never around, if it makes you feel better. He gave up on angels eons ago and humans a bit later after that."

She blanched. It all pinged for her again. She was not just suddenly the mother of a second child-should she suck up that responsibility and, oh fuck, Trixie's half-sibling was again the literal antichrist-but God, capital G, was the grandfather.

"I can't do this. I just…it's bad enough you're Satan."

"I'm the same person I ever was."

She glared at him. "But you're not just bad puns and juggling evidence. You're not just some guy who'll bitch about Monopoly but still play it with me and my daughter. You run hell!" 

"I'm retired."

"You ran hell, then. I just…why me?"

He finally left from the safety of the island, sidled as close to her as his growing girth would allow. Leaning low, he reached out and brushed the hair from her face and then rested one, warm palm against her cheek. Despite everything she knew, and she'd seen, Chloe allowed it. Because that other face even if she'd seen it again today didn't _feel _like him and maybe this was all a long game and a con, but she still cared for him, loved him.

And she was going to Hell, and she knew it now, no matter what Maze or Lucifer kept promising (who could trust their word anyway).

"Why wouldn't it be you, Chloe." And he so rarely used her given name that of all things, it sounded like a prayer on his lips. "You're the most beautiful thing my Father ever made. How could I keep myself from falling in love with you?" 

She pulled back then. The severity of his words snapping back to reality. That night…they'd made love and had sex and rolled in the sheets and promised no more going backwards, but he hadn't said those words to her.

Chloe wasn't…she couldn't process this. The devil-antichrist fucking in tow-was telling her he loved her, and she couldn't…what kind of a person did it make her if she just fell into what was easy, what made her feel good?

Sure it felt good. That was what Kinley had said, right? That he'd always change the approach until the temptation was just right. And with Lucifer, he was always tempting.

"I can't."

His face fell, and he nodded. "I know, and I knew that when you kept not coming back. I understand. Believe me, I know very well how monstrous I am. Thank you for coming to speak with me, for giving us closure." He stroked his belly. "I am not thrilled with such a mess, either, and I hate my body did this and my sodding, messed up subconscious too. I've the money and the resources. I won't even…should the spawn ask, I won't even tell it-not ever-about you. You have nothing to fear from me or from Hell or anything in between. You or Trixie." He sighed and slumped down finally in his chair, sliding down like a marionette with his strings cut. "I release you from anything you might even think you owe me." He paused then and stroked his abdomen again. "Or us. And I know you won't believe me, but I'm truly sorry, Chloe. I am."

She wanted to say a million things. Chloe wanted to tell him that the night they shared was the best of her life, that she owed him her and Trixie's lives, that the biggest part of wanting to quit was the fact that it would be impossibly boring and lonely without him as her consultant, that she'd probably fallen a little bit in love with him from the moment she'd seen his scars and wished like Hell she could track his bastard of a father (who was God and nope not getting used to that any time soon) down and make him pay for torturing his son. Chloe wanted to say that. She wanted to tell him other things too, like how she'd cried herself to sleep for two weeks when he'd just up and left for Vegas without a word, how she'd wanted to find something in her background check of Candy Morningstar that would have resulted in an arrest for the exotic dancer or whoever she was, that it shattered her heart into a million pieces when she found him in the loft and not because he'd killed Marcus.

She didn't give a good goddamn about Marcus and knew now she never had.

And yes, she wanted to tell him in words, even if he'd seen it twice from her reactions, that she was scared of him, that even now, part of her mind was filled by the horrific image of his true face. That she was upset she was so weak and worried as much as she loved her partner that she wasn't sure she could ever learn to love the devil.

She wanted to tell him _any _of that.

But she'd lost her voice and her nerve.

Instead, she nodded briskly at him. "I…thank you, Lucifer. I don't know if it's generous exactly, as you lied, but I need the clean slate. The safety."

His jaw clenched, and his eyes were shinier than they should have been. "I wish you'd understand that I'd never harm you. Chloe, I know you don't believe me, but I did love you. I still do. I just…"

"It's too much." She hurried to the door, her keys in hand. "I…take care of yourself, Lucifer." 

She did not mention the baby because her mind refused to wrap around such a concept. It would have been too much to say out loud without her finally breaking apart and ending up a rambling mess like Jimmy Barnes.

"And you too, detective."

She was halfway to her car when the text came in. A few lines from Father Kinley, whom she'd added as a contact back in Rome when they'd arrange morning theology lessons at local cafes.

_I know you're home with It. I'll be arriving shortly. Please, Detective Decker, you have to send Satan back to Hell. I can help you as best I can because the world __**needs**__ this._

She drove five blocks before pulling to the curb and vomiting over and over into some poor Beverly Hills socialite's bushes. What had she gotten herself into? She was pissed at Lucifer and, yes, terrified of him. But she still loved him (because she was clearly an idiot) and wouldn't ever hurt him, not like that. Yet the poison vile sat heavy in her purse, and she couldn't quite make herself toss it out either.

_And if I do this,_ she thought to herself. _If I attack Lucifer like this…that's my child too, and I can't. I just…I can't._

Dear God in heaven, or close enough since Lucifer implied that the Almighty took walkabouts a lot, what had she led to home to Los Angeles? What had she set loose on her family?

_And when the Hell had they become that?_

_No More Hiding_

She was a control freak.

This much Chloe had known once she'd taken her own career in hand at nineteen and after her father's wake. Once she'd broken from her mother's show business momager attitude, and then found her way to the Academy first and then as one of the precious few female cops in what Lucifer had once called a "man's man's world," Chloe had always had a plan and executed it without fail. She was tough, demanded excellence from her unis once she was full detective, and even if riding herd over Lucifer was a chore, she still did it, because she was the one people looked to when someone needed to take charge.

So, whether the problems were the newest shooting out by the 405 or giant, celestial bullshit that she barely understood (and strongly suspected Lucifer had even less of a clue about), Chloe got her bearings, made another plan, and executed it. It was why a month ago (and one week out from the disastrous masquerade ball at Lux), she'd stormed back into the penthouse with Maze, Eve, Linda, and Amenadiel all as backup to talk some form of sense into Lucifer. Because yes, since the twin realtor murder, his self-hatred had gone off the charts, and he was…Chloe preferred to think of it as not well. That was as good a euphemism for it as any.

Linda liked to call it not himself, although both Maze and Amenadiel had exchanged looks at that phrase.

Chloe ignored that. There was no way that as he looked now with giant bat wings and red, scarred skin and glowing eyes and enough desire mojo to make an entire party at luck confess to him out of nowhere a little-okay a lot-like a cult was his actual self. Lucifer had hit the most spectacular of rock bottoms after a year of metaphorical Hell at least, and it was all a trick his own subconscious was playing on him. They could fix this. Granted, in the last five weeks, they'd pretty much circled the block on he hated himself, wanted to forgive himself, and had fuck all idea how to do that, but it was something.

At least a small something.

And Chloe would be damned (heh), if she let him sit up alone and brood in his penthouse and locked away from even Team Celestial, such as they were, and hide until it all blew over. Considering everything was psychosomatic with him, that wouldn't get Lucifer anywhere either. So, she'd done the logical thing and lied her ass off. She'd told Dan she was taking some time off after the craziness of the Tiernan and Ponyboy case-after almost losing Trixie-and wanted to borrow his parents' lake house upstate for a while over the summer break. Mentioning Ponyboy was all she'd had to say and she'd been given her ex's blessing and promise that his parents were enjoying an extended trip to Cancun this summer and wouldn't be by anyway.

Good. She needed the remote location-miles from the nearest neighbor-to hide the Devil. Because Lucifer so could not control his mojo right now and while Team Celestial was immune (she'd always been, but Linda seemed to have built up a bit of tolerance to divinity by birthing it and Eve…well..she'd been dumped in spectacular fashion by Lucifer, which seemed an inoculation of its own against his charms), no one else was.

The distance from civilization was good for the recovery period.

So, that meant for the last few weeks, she'd been holed up with an angel, a demon, a baby Nephilim, her friend and only other normal human in the mix (and thank God also a shrink), the first woman ever, and the Prince of Darkness.

Most fun summer vacation ever, not.

Oh and Trixie who, apparently, had seen Maze's real demon face years ago, firmly believed both she and Lucifer were exactly who they said they were (cause children might be smarter than adults in some ways), and had found Lucifer as he was currently about "the coolest thing ever," was completely cool with all of this. Besides, like her, for whatever reason and it was probably genetic, Trixie couldn't be fazed by Lucifer's desire thing either.

Honestly, of all of them, Trixie was the best for him. And Maze, which was weird because he and Maze had fought a lot over the last few years, and now she and Eve were very hot and heavy. Chloe almost thought jealous would have reared its ugly head there, but it hadn't. If anything, you could take Lucifer Morningstar out of his penthouse tower and to the wilderness, but you couldn't keep him from locking himself away from others as he saw fit.

She'd tried the first week to get him to just hang out in the common areas. Dan's parents were loaded (his dad was some kind of computer chip engineer, stuff that made Chloe's eyes glaze over any time her father-in-law had tried to explain it to her) and their house was built on a wide-open floor plan principle. It was optimal, considering the sudden need that had come up. After all, Lucifer was massive right now. Not that he wasn't always tall, yet mostly lanky. Now, though, he had to be close to six and a half feet tall and so very broad even before you factored in the wings that wouldn't-couldn't-be retracted. Not to mention the horns.

And, yeah, that had been a shock to see when they'd all stormed the penthouse to drag him back to some contact with his friends again.

But okay, rolling with it, because Lucifer was still her partner and her best friend, and he might be mad at her for expecting too much of him and of is angelic side, but she was going to help him. Horns and all.

Except it wasn't going as planned. He was hiding again, only letting Maze speak with him or Trixie, and refusing even Linda's overtures. Chloe, herself, had tried to many times to get him to talk, just knocked on the door and he never even answered.

As far as getting him past the "I hate myself" stage and into the "I actually forgive myself" stage of the plan was going, well, it wasn't.

She was sitting at the kitchen, sipping on a Coke and thumbing through some dumb tabloid Eve had picked up at the store in town. She'd never been that famous or really famous at all, but occasionally she'd come across a story about someone she'd known before, and, as bummed as she was of late, a bit of Schaudenfreude wasn't beneath her. Linda and Amenadiel had taken a long walk with Charlie in tow in one of those papoose things, and Maze and Eve were away for the week bounty hunting in Colorado. It left her, the brooding Prince of Darkness-and damn it, she'd keep calling him that in her head until he came down a little bit from his snit and self-imposed exile-and her daughter. Currently, she could hear her daughter giggling down the hall.

Trixie was allowed to hang out with Lucifer.

And, okay, no…she wasn't jealous of her twelve-year-old, not really.

Trixie opened the door and it slammed quickly behind her. Her daughter skipped down the hall and climbed up onto a stool. Not that much climbing was involved. Her monkey was getting tall. She was soon going to lap Linda.

"Mommy, where's Charlie?"

She smiled, even if she rarely felt like it these days, and stroked a lock of hair back from her daughter's face. "Linda and Amenadiel took him for a walk. They only left five minutes or so ago down the trail. I bet if you hurry up, you can find them."

Trixie brightened but then bit her lower lip. Her eyes stole down the hall. "I dunno. I wouldn't want to leave Lucifer. I know he can't go out."

Chloe wanted to point out to some devils who would remain nameless that Lucifer _refused _to even leave his room. "No, baby, that's true."

"But we were in the middle of watching TV in his room, and I wouldn't want him to be sad. I promised I'd come back, but I don't really like _Bones_, and I want to say hi to Charlie today."

Chloe considered that and booped her daughter on the nose. To think that if Lucifer were mortal, were human like Tiernan assumed, her daughter would have been killed. Damn it, she'd never not owe Lucifer, and she wouldn't have it any other way. At least twice, he'd kept her daughter safe, and she could never-at least not now and after her crazy sojourn in Rome-see her as anything but a good man.

"Mom, I'm too old for that."

"You're still little to me, Monkey. How about you go see Charlie and everyone, and I go spend time with Lucifer?"

Trixie frowned and eyed the door at the end of the hall. "I dunno. He doesn't want…"

She nodded. "Monkey, do you know how sometimes when you're sick you have to take medicine that tastes awful and when you were really little, I'd have to keep you from spitting it out?"

"Yeah, but _Immodium_ really is gross!"

"True, but sometimes we have to do things we don't like to feel better."

"So, you're medicine?"

She nodded and stood up from her stool and scooped the magazine up with her. "Yeah, like that. Go on, enjoy being outside. It is summer, you know."

"But Lucifer…"

"I'll take care of him." Chloe crossed her heart over her chest. "Promise."

Trixie nodded hard and then rushed out the door toward the trail.

Chloe slipped down the hall and hoped that, for once, Lucifer expecting Trixie to be back (most likely loaded down with snacks, and Celestials were like bottomless pits) with munchies would play into her favor. She wrapped her fingers around the knob and twisted it open. The sight before her made her chest ache. The room was as neat as one would usually expect from Lucifer, although there was a game of _Candyland_ on the floor that was only half shoved in the box. But the massive California king was still decked out with soft, fluffy white sheets, and there wasn't some pile of cups and plates in the corner.

It was pleasant, would feel like the vacation home it was.

Except for the large devil laying out on his belly and facing the flat screen as some mind-numbing _Bones_ rerun (and she wasn't quite sure what he saw in that show as she was _nothing_ like Booth) blared in the background. Lucifer's eyes were closed-they burned too brilliantly to miss when they were open-and he must have drifted off waiting for Trixie. Chloe assumed he wasn't sleeping well lately, but Maze hadn't actually confirmed that for her. His wings were slack and spilled out at the edges of the bed and his back rose and fell with each breath, an act that made the spines in his back even more apparent than usual.

_No, not usual, just for now_, she chided herself.

Inching over the threshold, whisper quiet, she shut the door behind her and walked over to the armchair in the far corner of the room. Man, she had no idea what the Espinozas-who were lapsed Catholics at best-would have said about the devil asleep in their bedroom (it was the biggest in the place and Lucifer really needed the space), but to be fair, they were _ex_ inlaws and maybe you would expect something like this from a former daughter-in-law.

Kind of.

She made it through most of an episode, her focus mostly on Lucifer who snored lightly like this, which weird, before her wayward devil stirred. He blinked up blearily and those eyes like burning torches looked back on her until they found their focus.

Then Lucifer-Lord of Hell-bolted upright in bed and crashed to the ground, a tangle of wings and long, (now) brawny limbs.

"Bloody hell!"

That made her laugh and made her heart ache at the same time. Both the fact that he was clearly so scared of her seeing him but also because his voice wasn't exactly _his_. It was far deeper, gruffer than normal, tinged with a literal growl underneath that would have scared any sinner straight. The accent was still there and right now he was cursing a blue streak-or she assumed he was as she didn't know all the British slang even now-as he tried to untangle himself from the duvet.

She hopped to her feet and offered him her hand. "Can I help?"

He froze then, and it was the dumbest thing. Lucifer froze, barely even breathed, as if he thought she'd just go away if he were still enough. Finally, it seemed to dawn on him that she wasn't going anywhere. To borrow a phrase from him, of course she bloody well wasn't. She'd sat through _Bones_ to wait him out; he owed her.

"No need, detective. I'm fine."

He twisted again and the whole thing tore, feathers spilling out from the inner lining of the comforter as his claws dug into it. Lucifer growled and it was enough to scare a small, animal part of her brain that she clamped down hard on and told to shut up. The devil was designed to scare so of course Lucifer's subconscious had latched onto that in spectacular fashion. But that was just instinct, not reality. He was still _her_ Lucifer, and he was hurting. She just had to figure out the best way to reach him, and it was like walking up to an easily spooked colt. Or bird.

She eyed his wings.

Definitely more like a bird. One wrong move and he'd throw her out again.

"Are you sure you're fine?"

He finally surged to his feet even as the shreds of the duvet stayed crumpled at his feet. "See, fine. I'm sorry about the blanket. I can cover that of course."

She rolled her eyes. "I'll start a tab. Besides, you and Dan are kind of in this weird place right now. I figured ruining something of his would give you a giddy thrill. Douche revenge or whatever." 

"I don't intend to spread carnage in my wake, detective." He sighed and sat down on the bed, his wings gathered behind him like some gargoyle settled on Notre Dame's roof. "Or at least I try not to. Maze is still my business manager. She can get you the check cut and a much better duvet shipped here in days."

Chloe sighed and sat down on the bed next to him. Again, thank God Dan's family were so into creature comforts. The two of them wouldn't have fit side by side on anything but a California king, at least for now. "Has everyone ever said that they want you for more than your wallet?"

He seemed to forget himself and this last shitty month for a moment. Lucifer grinned at her, that knowing smirk different on that reddened face and yet familiar. "Many men and women have wanted me for one thing in particular, detective. Jealous?"

Oh yes she was, but that was not something she'd ever said or would say out loud to him.

Reaching out, she set a hand over his large one, avoiding the talons there. He looked down and then flinched, his expression crestfallen when he remembered what he actually looked like. Lucifer's reaction was instantaneous, and he struggled to pull his hand away. She clamped down as hard as she dared. He was infinitely stronger than she was, could have yanked harder if he'd wanted to, but she didn't move, hoping he'd understand her.

"Don't," she said. "I like this, and I've missed you."

His shoulders slumped and his wings fell a bit, but he stopped moving. "You don't have to."

"Don't have to what?"

Lucifer's preternaturally bright eyes seemed to dim. "Be near me. It's okay. Maze said this bounty would only take a week, and I assume your offspring got bored of me-sitting and snuck off to play on her mobile or swim or something like that. I'm quite fine alone."

Her first instinct was to shout "bullshit" at him, but she didn't think that would help. Derailing into an argument would make him shut down faster.

"I don't think you are. Fine, I mean."

Lucifer snorted. "Fair point, well made. I'm not exactly my usual tall, dark, and handsome self. Well, still tall, not so much the other two these days, but it's a blip and I'll…"

"You won't talk to me or to Linda," Chloe pointed out. "How can you get better if you push away your friends and your therapist. I…Eve and Amenadiel want to help too."

He clenched his jaw and finally pulled his hand away. She flinched at the loss of contact. It had been so very long since she'd touched him, even before this latest mess…they'd been circling each other and dealing with betrayals and boundaries. Her mind flashed to Forest Clay's balcony a year ago and even the beach at sunset so much longer before. She missed him.

And he might be having some crazy existential crisis right now, but horns or not, batwings or not, Lucifer was still the same. And she still loved him. Even if after everything with Father Kinley, he probably, deep down, barely tolerated her.

"I don't want to subject you to a monster, Chloe."

She frowned back at him. She could count on two hands how many times he'd ever used her first name, and she'd still have fingers left over, even now.

Chloe smiled up at him, noting that while he'd always been tall, she was craning her neck fiercely now to see eye to eye with him. "I don't see one."

"There's not space in here for me to pace," he grumbled. "I don't want to throw you out. I might be the stuff of nightmares, but I like to think of myself as a man of wealth and taste. So, you have me at the mercy of my manners. You leave when you choose, but you don't have to stay. I know I'm hideous." He snorted. "Thanks Dad and all the stupid ways angels work or don't…makes this even worse to know I'm doing it to myself but can't even sodding stop it."

She nodded and wished she could touch him again, but she was scared if she tried, he'd leave instead. Flap those wings for him and take off for a flight around the recesses of the deep woods surrounding the cabin.

"I _want_ to be here."

"Because I'm a pet project, emphasis on the pet. I don't have to be. I'm sure there are tons of murders to solve back home. The rest of the force would be lost without you, except for possibly Miss Lopez." He sighed and studied his claws. "I do miss her."

"I know."

"Miss most of the gang at the precinct. They grow on you."

"They do."

"Don't miss the Douche much. Glad Trixie takes after her mum."

"Flattery will get you everywhere, Lucifer."

He smiled and the tension in his shoulders relaxed. "I know, but I also understand that I bother you…me being the Devil I mean. Can't really change that. Been a fact longer than human history and all that. You saw my face and it sent you to Rome. Can't imagine seeing all of this makes you feel anything but afraid."

"Are Eve or Linda or Trixie afraid?"

"No," he said softly. "But they're different."

"Trixie's half me."

"The braver half, maybe," he replied. She wasn't sure he'd tried for a joke and fallen flat or not. "Trixie, and I apologize perhaps for letting my demon run wild, but she was half-raised by a demon for the last three years. She's more used to the bizarre than any human has a right to be. To the infernal to be exact."

"But you let her see you."

He frowned down at her and, even like this, the tilt of his head as he puzzled out a mystery was the same. "You ran. I know you're sorry about Kinley, and that git took advantage of your confusion. Glad he's rotting in jail overseas."

"Me too."

"But you _are_ scared of me. You cried at the masquerade when you first saw me. I know…I don't want you to see what I am, underneath, or how I feel about myself. Hate that you made me spell it out, detective, but how could I not be embarrassed by all of this?"

She nodded and touched his shoulder or, well, as much of it as she could reach. "First of all, you don't know me as well as you think you do."

"I disagree, Chloe Jane Decker. I know a lot about you."

"Well, if you're such an expert, then you'd know that sometimes I cry when I'm scared _for_ someone. That night in the loft, I couldn't keep myself from crying because I felt badly for you."

"Don't need pity either. I'm a big devil, can handle my own problems." He pulled away completely then, flaring up his wings and enveloping himself away from her. "If you'll see yourself out, detective, I'd appreciate that."

"You don't get to do that," she said, her voice raw.

"Don't I?"

"No, you always call the shots here. You knew more than I did in our relationship, always did. So you decided when you ran off to Vegas or when and how to tell me things including that I was literally engaged to the world's first murderer."

Lucifer flinched at that but still stayed wrapped up and blocked by his wings. "I suppose that's true."

"It damn well _is_ true. But nuh-uh. I know everything. My daughter even knows everything, and you're as confused and lost and unsure of how to fix this self-actualization thingy as the rest of us."

"Thingy, great, downplay my problems now."

"Lucifer, I'm serious. You run. Every time things get hard, you run away."

Oh, that did it, she must have struck a nerve. Lucifer turned back to her, as fast as a striking cobra and his eyes burned russet. "You ran last time. I'm afraid if you stay too long with me, you'll go to bloody Tokyo or Shanghai and never come back."

"I won't."

He frowned. "You should." Lucifer held up his burned, gnarled hands and held his claws out toward her. "The lot of you, minus Maze since this was what she was created for, are idiots. You should leave me be. It's what I deserve."

"No, you don't."

"You can't know that."

She sighed and restrained herself from reaching out to him. He'd just rabbit right now, she could tell, and she needed Lucifer to not just hear what she had to say but listen to it. "You saved Trixie's life. Do you understand that? Do you have any idea what that means to me? Maybe you have a small clue with a nephew of your own."

He puffed up his chest. "Not fond of screaming spawn, not my thing. I only want to get to know Charlie when he's old enough to take to a strip club or give a car to."

She rolled her eyes. "Sure."

It wasn't true. The precious few times she'd seen him come out of his room had been to sit quietly on the sofa and at least attempt holding his nephew. It was the one activity he'd deign to do near Linda because so far therapy was out of the question. And despite his issues, despite being trapped in a body he didn't have complete control over, Lucifer had held Charlie in small bouts with reverential delicacy. His eyes glittering like flames and filled with utter wonder at the tiny Nephilim in his hands.

"But Trixie is my whole world, Lucifer. She's the one good thing Dan and I ever made together."

He laughed at that. It still sounded wrong, feral somehow, but it had a throaty undertone that reminded her of how things used to be. "You said it about the Douche, not I."

"You know what I mean. Ponyboy could have killed her, and you kept her safe."

"You weren't around. I was in no danger, myself."

"It melted my heart, Lucifer. After all the shit we'd been through, after all of it, that was how I knew we'd be okay because when you said you'd do anything to keep her safe, I _believed_ you. I mean, okay, we'll play it your way. Say you're right."

"Mostly am, detective."

"Now if that's not a revisionist history of our cases, I don't know what is," she huffed. "But say I'm terrified of you and find the big, scary devil a repulsive monster who totally bites the head off children."

"I don't like children. They'd taste awful," he grumbled half-heartedly.

She smiled up at him and hoped he'd understand, that he could believe her. "If I really thought you were a monster, I'd do everything in my power to keep Trixie from you. You know that I would, don't you?"

"Yes." He said, his voice barely a whisper.

"Have I?"

"No, the spawn's always here. I…it's been peaceful. I don't know how I'd have made it the last few weeks without her," he sighed and set his hands on his thighs, his claws digging into the cotton of his sweatpants and, frankly, it was the first sign she'd had that Lucifer was probably going to pull through this-when he'd started bitching that none of his slacks would work and how humiliating his sartorial options were.

If Lucifer could complain and be so prissy, he'd probably be okay.

Eventually.

"Because I trust you with her implicitly. The most valuable part of my life, Lucifer, and I would never let a monster near her. I'd never let anyone watch her and bond with her unless I trusted them with my entire heart. Do you understand that?"

"I think so?"

"A monster wouldn't have saved her. You might not be an angel-"

He growled then and it was loud enough to fucking rattle the windows. "I'm quite literally the farthest thing on any plane from an angel. Ask Amenadiel and Maze both if you're so dense."

She didn't take the bait. "So am I wrong? Are you a monster?"

"I look like one." 

"That's not what I asked. Would you hurt her? Would you ever hurt her or Charlie?"

"Never! Detective, you have to believe that."

She leaned against him and set her head on his broad chest. The skin there was warm to the touch as if he were fighting a raging fever. It was jagged too, burned and scarred and marred with deep furrows in the skin. She didn't move because she didn't want him to think she regretted leaning against him. She didn't, but she was scared it hurt him, that the skin beneath her cheek still ached.

"Then you do too. You're a good man, Lucifer, and I mean that. You think a cop isn't a good judge of character?"

"Not all," he said. And his hand found her hair and started to stroke it. Hesitantly at first, his claws occasionally tangling just a bit in her hair. "But you should still run. I…all I do is break things."

"I'm still here," she said, echoing the words she'd said to him at the masquerade ball.

"You shouldn't be. I started a rebellion and got dozens of my siblings snuffed out of existence. I tortured souls in hell for eons and, yes, I delegated some, but a lot I didn't. I have done every possible thing you can imagine and things you can't to bring suffering and to mar human flesh. I…I made a fucking mess of everything with you, and then left you vulnerable to Cain. Please, I've been thinking about things a lot lately."

"And?"

"Maze doesn't want to do this. She voted against it, and how things change," he said, marveling to himself.

"What?" she asked, her heart thundering in her chest. If even Maze thought something was a terrible idea, then it had to be a clusterfuck of a plan. Typically Lucifer.

"I should go home"

"If you want to be back at the penthouse, sure, that's doable."

He sighed but kept stroking her hair. "To Hell. It's where I belong, and I have to stop lying to myself."

She sat up then and glared at him. If he thought his eyes could flare with anger, then he hadn't really even yet met a pissed off Decker. She got her temper from her dad, after all. "What?"

"I…" he stopped and took in a shuddering breath. Then eyed his claws again. "I don't belong here. I was lying to myself that I ever did."

"Please don't go. Don't leave us…" she reached up and stroked his cheek. "Don't leave _me_."

"It would be best for you. Then you could move on, find a non-immortal and totally normal bloke, someone a sight better than the Douche even."

She got to her knees on the bed and reached up as high as she could, maneuvering her free hand to encircle one of his horns. A sexy dream from long ago came to her mind, and she tried to ignore the way her belly flared with heat. Man, would she be analyzing that later with Linda. Yeesh.

"Don't…Please," he said, and his voice was layered with so much anguish that it broke her heart.

Chloe stroked his cheek and horn both and shook her head. "I won't until you take my deal." 

"And what's that?"

"I want a year."

"Beg your pardon?"

"A year, you heard me. I want a year after we get you back to yourself and we're back at the precinct and you're running Lux. If after a year of the normal hustle and bustle between us, you still think you belong in Hell-when we both know you don't-then you can go and I won't fight you on it."

His eyes flashed white hot, and she forced herself not to flinch. He was trying to scare her but she wasn't just her instincts, she knew better. "You couldn't stop me now."

"No, but I hope you'd stay. We will fix this. We will figure out how to make you you again the same way Amenadiel fixed his wings problem."

"Maybe this is me. The new me…" he sighed heavily. "Perhaps the real me."

"It's a punishment because you're torturing yourself, but even if…give me the year at least."

"Even if I always am just this handsome devil?" The joke fell flat, and he looked so incredibly tired and ancient staring back at her.

She kissed him then, and it felt so different than on the beach or on that balcony long ago. Different, not worse. His skin was dry and incredibly chapped under her ministrations, but then he finally relented and kissed her back, his tongue doing truly sinful things against her own, even as both her hands moved to grip and caress his horns just as in her dream.

When they pulled back, Lucifer's eyes reminded her of stars. They shone so beautifully, and how could he not see that in himself? How could she help him? How could they all do better for him?

"I don't…Chloe, I don't understand." He was panting back at her and she was slightly heady from the fact that she'd left the Devil gasping for more.

"I love you," she said before kissing him again.

He pulled away a second time, but it was a slow motion, as if he were reluctant to let her go. "You can't possibly. No one ever does."

Chloe signed and snuggled up against his chest, grateful when he wrapped his arms around her. "But I do, and, you know, you have a whole house of people here that love you too. I mean, okay, Eve's a little skittish but she still cares about you as a friend, and I totally get you and Maze have had ups and downs, and Amenadiel was a dick brother to you for a long time…"

"I think you're sinking your own case, detective."

"But," she finished, burrowing into his side. "We all love you, and so, seriously, fuck your father."

"I don't necessarily recommend pissing Dad off. It never ends well."

"I don't care. Your father…your siblings up in heaven…they're _wrong_."

"Angels and God usually aren't."

"Don't you always say they are?"

"I do but…just not this time, Chloe."

It broke her heart all over again to hear the self-loathing in his voice. Hurt worse than it did to see what that fear and belief did to his body, was still doing to it. But they had time. If she had to just make the whole house take turns hugging Lucifer until he fucking finally got it, they would.

"You have a family. It's weird and messed up and there's about four different species in it, which is still really messing with my brain, but it's yours and we love you."

"I hope so," he said, but from the resignation in his tone, she knew he was humoring her.

She turned back to him and kissed him one last time. Then she grinned and rubbed his horns once more. "Besides, ask Maze, these have always been a turn on for me."

It was worth the embarrassing confession to render the Lucifer Morningstar speechless for once.  
**

_Welcome to the Show_

Chloe blinked.

Her head was spinning. Nothing made sense. She'd been working a case with that bizarre woman from the alternative music club not far from the strip in Los Angeles, and then Jimmy Barnes had pulled out a gun and had he shot her?

She bolted upright and her head swam worse. When she blinked, she found herself back in the club. The posters from a dozen garage bands served as wallpaper on the aging walls, and the faint sting of beer was invading her nose, making her nausea worse. In the corner, the woman who'd been tracking down Delilah's death, Azrael (no last name), was arguing with a tall man with wings. Huge, fluffy, white wings.

And everything inside of Chloe told her that this wasn't some cosplay or a prop.

"What the actual fuck?"

Both the man-oh crap-the angel (?) and the annoyingly babbly club owner jerked around to look at her. Azrael recovered first and glared back at the freaking angel standing off to the corner. "Great job, Samael. This is so not good."

The angel glared back at Azrael. "Since when have you ever cared about what Dad thought? Isn't that your whole motif, little sister? It was your rebellion after all."

Chloe blinked. Okay, so she thought Azrael talking about being the devil was some part of her hipster persona. The thought that the tiny woman with the bowl cut, Coke bottle glasses, and her tendency to say "dude" every five minutes was Satan, like the real Satan, was laughable. And yet she was here arguing with an honest to God angel.

"I…what's going on?"

The angel (Samael, right?) glared at his sister and sighed. "What do you remember?"

"Azrael and I just pieced together that Jimmy Barnes arranged the hit on Delilah, and we were taking him in at the studio. I…I got shot, didn't I?"

Samael looked down at his feet, his posture gone slack, making his frame seem somehow even longer and lankier than it already was. "Yes, you did."

Azrael shook her head. "Dude…Chloe, I'm sorry to have to tell you this, but you didn't get shot. You got _dead_. Your number was up."

She stilled. That couldn't be true. "I'm right here."

Azrael kicked her brother in the shin and the angel yelped. "Bloody Hell, Sis, a little warning next time, yeah?"

"You made this mess. I don't want any part of it. I'm out of Dad's wrath and bullshit."

Samael's wings flared behind him and Chloe's brain skittered into a blue screen of death. They were huge, gorgeous, and had to be at least fifteen feet across tip to tip. "No, that's not how this works. You called in a favor from me ten years ago in Detroit. I spared your little forensic scientist. You've no idea-none-what I had to offer for leverage over Gabriel and his audits. You're the one bloody obsessed with favors. This is mine. You help me hide what I've done from Dad, just like I did with Ella, and we don't have a problem."

Azrael's eye flashed red, and Chloe's breath caught in her throat. No, not just red. Fucking Hellfire because Azrael was the devil and her brother was an angel and apparently the only reason Chloe Decker wasn't dead was because an angel had broken the rules just for her…and was apparently trying to drag Satan into it along with him.

That couldn't be a good thing.

She was done with this. It didn't matter that an angel and apparently Satan-ette were arguing over her mortal soul. She was a cop, she was right here, and she wasn't going to be debated over like a prize. Especially like she wasn't even in the room. Hopping from the table and ignoring her dizziness, Chloe pulled out her badge and held it up high.

"Hey, okay assholes, let's actually talk about this. My brain is not dealing great with the fact that angels are real, Satan's a thing, and I apparently am supposed to be dead. I'll deal with that existential crisis later. However, I don't care who you are or how many literal cosmic powers you have, no one is taking me to heaven or hell." She was proud of her ability not to freak out over that second option. "I'm alive now, and I'm staying that way. Now, if you could actually tell me something useful or get me back to my daughter, I'd appreciate it."

Azrael let out a low whistle. "Oh, I get it now." Her eyes grew brown again, and she grinned up at her (apparently) older brother. God, how could this woman be the devil? She seemed like a barely out of college hipster. Seriously? "I see what you liked in her." She pushed the glasses up the bridge of her nose. "I'll talk to Ella; she's always been smarter than I am. She might have some thoughts on how to hide two mortals who aren't supposed to be here."

"So, you'll honor your deal?"

She shook her head. "I promise you that disobeying Father never ends well. I thought that was something everyone else in the Silver City figured out after I fell."

Samael blushed and it turned his cheeks so adorably red. That and the unruly curls he sported would have definitely attracted Chloe to him, if they'd just met at this club under normal circumstances and not under life and death stakes. Oh, and if he apparently weren't an angel with massive, freaking wings. "I understand, and I am sorry, Azrael."

The woman stiffened and made a show of cleaning her glasses. Nope, definitely didn't think Satan would be nearsighted either. "Dude, I never wanted you to fall with me, not really. It's not fun. Like so much less fun than it _looks_."

There was the quickest flash and for a second, Chloe swore Azrael's face was a mottled collection of red, raw scars.

Had she imagined that?

No, she hadn't because Samael quickly shifted his eyes away and to the ground. "I shall worry about Father's price when and if it comes. Little sister, it means everything to me that you're going to help."

"Don't thank me yet. So doesn't usually end well hanging with the devil."

Samael grinned and finally his wings seemed to disappear, leaving a normal looking man-albeit one in a dark black robe-standing before Azrael. "There are few places I would rather be."

She sighed and shook her head. "Cause you need me."

He reached over and squeezed her shoulder. "I'd like to think we've been on better terms in the last decade, haven't we?"

She nodded. "Alright, but we're so far from out of the woods yet, it's not even funny. Gabriel isn't always going to be convinced to overlook accounting mistakes. You probably don't have any leverage left this time."

"Not as such, no."

She swore under her breath. "I'll see what Amenadiel can offer. He and I have an understanding."

Samael laughed. "I'll never suss out how you brokered a deal with him. He's always been a humorless tosser."

"Well, there's a reason you're totally my favorite, but, unfortunately, it's because most of our siblings suck hardcore." Azrael waved back at Chloe and headed to the club's office. "You can't leave here until I talk with Amenadiel and call in a few favors. It won't be safe yet, but there's a kitchen on the second floor. We do like appetizers. You're probably starving so Samael knows enough to heat up some mozzarella sticks and we have a lot of OJ here. We do a great screwdriver, really. And, uh, I'll just call Ella and then see if I can get Amenadiel on the line. He's usually eager to talk to me."

"Since when?" Samael queried.

"Since five years ago and him being desperate to get me back to Hell." She shook her head. "Now, you really need to bring your pet human up to speed. They get really upset when you don't talk to them. Trust me, I get my share of lectures from Ella."

Samael nodded and bowed his head. "Tell Miss Lopez I send my regards."

"Will do, so I'm outtie guys."

With that, Satan, the apparent Princess of Darkness retired to her office.

Samael stayed in his corner of the room at first. "Be not afraid."

Chloe having finally decided she'd cracked up somewhere along the way and must actually be in and out of it on a ventilator at the hospital after Jimmy Barnes shot her, laughed hysterically. Samael frowned back at her and then looked toward the office like he realized he might have made a mistake.

"Miss, uh, Detective Decker, was it?" 

"Chloe's fine. If you're an angel who brought me back from the dead, I guess we should be on a first name basis, Samael."

He nodded but kept his hands up. She studied him then, beyond the blush still heating his cheeks and mop of thick, dark curls she'd love to lose herself in. Samael was tall but lean with a prominent nose and chin as well as the softest, most sincere brown eyes she'd ever seen. They were so incredibly guileless. And hopeful.

"Yes, that would be fair, wouldn't it?"

She frowned and crossed the distance between them. "Sorry for laughing. The whole 'be not afraid' thing was like something out of the Bible, and then I realized my life literally is now. She held her hand out and Samael stared down at it, quirking his head at her like a confused bird of a prey. Which, okay, he wasn't but he certainly had a better wingspan than one.

"Have you ever shaken hands before?"

"Why ever would I do that?"

She let out a sharp exhale. "Okay, so um, angel learning curve. Put your hand in mine and we'll shake. It's how we break the ice with each other."

"There's no water around and it's actually quite warm in the club." 

She took his hand and mimicked the motion of shaking until he understood. "You don't mingle with humanity much, do you?"

"I'm fairly busy with my work. I duck in to see my sister when I have time. She's much better at human things than I am. I also enjoy spending time with her girlfriend Ella, but she gives hugs."

"I…I'm not sure we're up to that stage yet." 

"Oh, heavens me," he said. "I suppose not."

She frowned again. "Why is Azrael not British sounding. Oh, wait, does everyone in Heaven sound British? This is really confusing!"

"Azrael had a Californian accent for a while, her own affectation for when she has holidays on Earth. Long story. But sometimes, I think, some of the Detroit slang from Ella is bleeding into her conversations. I've spent many eons on Earth doing my work. I just fancied the way this sounded." He shrugged. "It does seem to comfort people ever so."

"I…so are you like the angel of hospitals? I mean, help me out here. I never really went to church. I mean, we got Trixie baptized but that was because of Dan's parents. But I'm unfamiliar with who does what. So, you're the angel of sickness or something?"

Samael pulled his hand back and then shoved both of them amongst the folds of his robes. "No, not quite."

Chloe frowned, in no mood after the day and night she'd had to be talked at or only told half-truths. "Then which angel are you?"

He sighed and looked down at his feet. Man, he was not a good poker player, too many tells. Then again, angels probably didn't gamble either. Was that in the Bible? Shit did she need to buy one of those now?

"I'm the Angel of Death."

Chloe looked down at her hand as if she'd drop dead at any second because she'd touched him. "What?"

He shook his head and held his hands up again, palms up in supplication. "I misspoke. I mean, I am the Angel of Death, but I don't _cause_ it. It's not like some bloody Midas touch. I collect based on my schedule. You were on it, but I just…I couldn't collect."

Chloe tried to remember what breathing felt like as she struggled to speak. "I...I…"

"Miss Decker, are you alright?"

"No. I spent the last week working on a case with Satan, as in the actual horns and pitchfork devil."

"Azrael doesn't actually have those."

She narrowed her eyes at him. "Not the point. I was working a case with the literal Devil, shot to death apparently, and now the only reason I'm still alive is because the Angel of fucking Death stepped in. I…why did you do this? Does this happen often?"

Samael shook his head, his unruly curls falling in his eyes. "No, only once before because Azrael offered me a favor to save Ella's life." He shrugged. "My sister's very powerful, don't let her persona fool you. More than a few of our siblings always figured Dad banished her to rule Hell because she was a real threat to him."

"Not making me feel better."

He stood straighter at that. "She's a good person, but I was curious enough to take her offer. I'm glad I did because I didn't want you dead."

"Why not? If you've been collecting humans a while…"

"About six thousand years, started with Eve after she'd died of old age. Lovely woman."

Chloe blinked. "Wait, as in 'Adam and Eve?'"

"Yes, you've heard of her. You said you hadn't read the Bible."

"Well, some things stick. So, Jesus is real?"

"Yes, why wouldn't he be?"

Chloe shook her head. "I'm gonna need so much time to process all of this. But, I…not that I want you to change your mind."

He clenched his jaw and nodded fiercely before speaking. "I would never do that."

She let out a breath she didn't know she'd been holding in. For Trixie's sake, she was relieved. She absolutely could not leave her daughter behind. "But why me? There's nothing special about me. You have to have taken so many cops before me, probably will tomorrow too."

Samael stepped close to her and leaned down and kissed her chastely on the cheek. "I'm not sure yet, but there's something about you. It just called to me, but it should be fun figuring it all out, shouldn't it?"

She blinked back at him. It was far from reassuring to find out that she was alive because of an angel's capricious curiosity and the actual, literal Devil interceding on her behalf. She was so going to Hell someday. Perfect.

"I…what?"

He smiled at her and it was nothing short of beatific. "There's everything striking about you, Miss Decker, truly unique. I never understood till now what my sister saw in living humans-don't get to meet many of those-but I think I finally understand it now." He gave her a small bow, so painfully formal this one. "Now, I am far from a gourmet cook, but I can manage. Would you fancy some juice and cheese or not?" He punctuated his question but bending his elbow at his side and waiting for Chloe to take it.

Her life was seriously FUBAR'ed. She'd apparently died and now was friends-or something at least-with Satan and the Angel of Death, and Chloe would need to keep a cosmically low profile to make sure God-yeah that one-didn't snuff her out to right his ledgers. And she still had to get home as soon as possible to keep her estranged husband and poor, sweet Trixie from freaking out. Her mind should be a gibbering mess, honestly.

And yet, when the surprisingly courtly Samael smiled down at her like that, she couldn't help but feel at peace. Taking his arm, she let him lead her to the kitchen where she watched him work in a flurry of fluid motion to whip up a snack.

Honestly, they were the best damn mozzarella sticks she'd ever had.

_Bonus – Eat Your Heart Out, Daenerys Targaryen_

Chloe was pissed. She was beyond pissed. She was motherfucking Mount Vesuvius, and she was about to level Pompeii in her anger. What an utter crock. She'd replayed the voicemail from Lucifer for the billionth time in the last two weeks. Sure, over the line he promised he'd finally show her the full truth about himself, and she'd been dumb enough to believe him. To have hope.

Yet no one, not even Maze or Amenadiel had heard from Lucifer in two weeks. Last time he pulled this stunt, he'd run off to Vegas and come back with some utter bimbo of a wife. So help her, if he came back with another ditzy blonde on his arm, Chloe would kill him. Well, maybe not kill him, since she'd never kill even a rat like Lucifer apparently was. However, she might shoot him in the other leg, at least make it even.

Because Lucifer "I Never Lie" Morningstar was the biggest fraud she'd ever met and every time…every time she let herself hope they could be more, that he would grow the hell up and just try and move past some of his issues to commit to her (and, seriously, while she liked Linda, she was worried about the other woman's skill as a psychiatrist), he always spazzed out.

It was a quiet Friday night. Dan had Trixie, and Maze was out on a bounty somewhere upstate. She'd already scarfed down a frozen pizza and caught up on some reruns on Netflix, and, okay, the second time Netflix asked her if she were sure she still was watching _Friends_, even Chloe had to admit that Maze of all people was right and she had literally no social life. It was ten o'clock on a Friday and she was only thirty-eight, not dead. She could go out.

But as she drove past the clubs-Lux included-it was the last place she wanted to go. Instead, she turned out toward the coast and kept onwards until she reached the beach. _That _beach, the one where she'd had her only real kiss with Lucifer. God, she was so pathetic. It would have been more respectable to be curled up in her bed in her sweats still watching Ross and Rachel circle each other for five more episodes before she passed out.

Because Lucifer wasn't going to be here. He had barely been present when he was around, and she wasn't going to magically step onto that beach-their beach-and find him waiting for her like something out of _From Here to Eternity_.

Sighing, she slid down to the sand and set her head in her hands. The dull roar of the ocean was soothing at least, but it didn't do enough to calm the ache in her heart. Despite every instinct she'd ever had, despite knowing he was not only an immature playboy who had slept with half the state by now, despite the fact he was quite possibly very seriously delusional, she'd fallen for him. And her heart ached without him.

"I wanted to believe you, Lucifer. Why did you do this to me?" Her tone was low, plaintive, and utterly pathetic. She was so glad that no one else was on the sands this late at night. Because look at how lovesick she'd become.

"Chloe."

She closed her eyes and buried her face in her arms and against her knees. Perfect, now she was hallucinating about him. Maze had every right to tease her; she was an idiot.

"Chloe. I…don't turn around."

She raised her head and blinked. Nope, she had to hearing things. Because yes, that was Lucifer's voice, his posh accent wafting on the wind, and yet…he sounded wrong somehow too. His voice far too deep for his usual tenor and almost garbled.

"I'm not going crazy. I am not." She arched her head over her shoulder and there was a flash of movement in the shadows, and she had no idea what the Hell was going on or why Lucifer-if he were here-was hiding in the caves back on the cove. "Lucifer?"

He called out more loudly to her but didn't come out from the dark recesses of the caves behind her, not yet. "Detective, it's best if you stay where you are."

She jumped to her feet and rounded on him, wherever he was. "Are you kidding me? How did you even know I was here? Are you stalking me even though you've apparently quit all your jobs? Just exactly what is going on?"

"No, but it's rather complicated."

That was it. She'd dealt for over a year with the endless bullshit that was Lucifer Morningstar and his Satan-themed delusions, and she was done with it. Was this all some joke to him? Was this how he got his amusement, by playing with her? Chloe strode into the dark recesses of the caves by the shore and expected to see him somewhere back there, probably smoking, but what she found instead left her shaking in her tracks.

She'd run across the dunes and into the network of caves only to come across a large form huddled against the side of the biggest cavern. As the clouds moved away from the waxing moon, the light caught the bulk before her, and it couldn't be possible. Literally could not be because standing before her was a dragon.

A giant dragon with red scales, yellow slit eyes, and a long tail that swished back and forth behind it. Oh, and giant wings the size of half a football field on either side of it. Because of course, it did, and Chloe really had gone insane.

The dragon made no move toward her, but it did bow its head and somehow, and she had no idea how, its eyes seemed to fill with sadness. "I asked you to stay where you were. Detective, I didn't…I never would have anticipated you'd have come this way." 

Chloe brought a hand to her mouth and tried to will herself to stop shaking. But she couldn't. Every instinct she'd ever had told her that the dragon before her was not only impossible but also dangerous. God, if she moved would it breathe fire on her? Could it? Wait, oh how far gone was she? Why did it sound like Lucifer?

"Lucifer?" She finally gasped out.

The dragon…_Lucifer_…nodded _his_ head but stayed pressed tightly against the cave. "I mean you no harm. I…it's rather confusing."

She wanted to laugh, but she was afraid if she started, she'd never stop. "I'm not high am I?"

"I wish I were," he moaned.

"And I'm not actually crazy and taking my turn in the mental hospital, am I?"

Yellow eyes narrowed at her. "I was undercover for the God Johnson case. I was never actually mad, ta ever so. I always said I was the Devil. Well, detective," he flicked his tail to emphasize his point. "…may I introduce you to the great Beast of Revelation. Happy to make your acquaintance."

"Huh?" It was the least prosaic thing she could have said, but it was the only thing she could squeak out. The dragon-Lucifer, dear fuck it was Lucifer-didn't scare her as much as it had a few minutes ago. It had more to do with hearing Lucifer's voice (more or less) coming from him and his pissy tone arguing back at her than even just getting used to the sight of a real live dragon in front of her. "What?"

Lucifer let out a sigh and, nope, not actually getting used to things yet because a plume of smoke escaped from his snout. (He had a snout!) "Right, of course I'd fall for an atheist, makes perfect sodding sense. I assume you've never read Revelation."

"No," she said, shaking her head with a ferocity that would make a bobblehead seem subtle.

He shrugged one great shoulder. "Well, no real harm done. I never put much stock in it until now, and I am sure most professed Christians haven't." He cleared his throat before continuing, and a second plume sprang from his nose. "_Then another sign appeared in heaven: an enormous red dragon with seven heads and ten horns and seven crowns on its heads.__Its tail swept a third of the stars out of the sky and flung them to the earth._"

Chloe frowned up at Lucifer, and at least she was accepting her apparent breakdown because she was more confused by the fact he didn't match the scripture he'd just quoted than the fact he was, currently, a giant, talking dragon. "Don't take this the wrong way, but you don't have any horns and just the one head."

If this were any other day previously in their relationship, he'd have taken such an opening for a truly terrible sexual pun. Instead, he shrugged again. "Don't have any bloody crowns either, but then old John-Boy was on quite the hallucinogen filled trip when he jotted this rubbish down." He paused that that. "Didn't see him getting the dragon part correct, though. Imagine my annoyance that it was an actual heads up I missed."

Huh?

"You've never done this before?"

"No, this is new. I was rushing over to see you after leaving my message, then I was knocked out, and the next thing I know I woke up in the bloody desert like this." He flicked his tail as if she could possibly be confused by what he meant. That part almost seemed to fit the prophecy though, she could see a tail that impressive sweeping stars from the very sky.

"Then you didn't call me." It was a dumb thing to say. Even if he could have literally worked a phone-completely doubtful-what would he have said? She didn't even believe he was the devil. Dragon was going to be a bigger leap.

He arched an eyebrow at her. "I'm sorry I failed to ring you. Where were my manners."

"It's possible to abuse sarcasm."

"Never," he said, bringing a talon to his chest. "I always use just the right amount. I…honestly don't have much of a plan. Not like Dad would talk to me. He _never_ talks to any of us, and I'm far from his favorite child. If this is his grand plan, well, to be the good guy, you need a fall guy, don't you?"

She felt sick as bile rose in her throat. Was he really implying his Father (God so weird) would do this to him on purpose to make himself look better? Granted metaphysical transformations were far above her paygrade, but she'd do anything to spare Trixie pain. Never in a million years would she do anything to set Trixie up for pain, let alone force her to be the so-called bad guy to make her, Chloe, look better.

"Your father is a real asshole."

Lucifer chuffed, and his eyes glittered in the night. "A sentiment I've always held close to my heart, detective. If I were more cynical, and who I am bloody well kidding, I'm not cynical enough when it comes to Him…However, I'd say that it might just be dear old Dad was bored and buggering up my life just because he can amuses him."

"I…" she strode toward him and set her hand on the tip of his nose. It was warm to the touch like the stones around a roaring hearth, and Chloe could barely understand how completely impossible her life had become in the last half hour. Or, alright, if she were honest with herself, since she'd strode into Lux and listened to Lucifer's spiel about just loving to play in general. "You think he did this on purpose because you were going to tell me about you?"

"Because I might have had one sodding chance in billions of years to be happy. Dad's a right bastard, couldn't have that, can we?" Lucifer sighed morosely and pulled his snout away from her. "I didn't know where to go." He arched his neck and took in the great expanse of his body that was easily the side of a couple rail cars linked together. "Don't exactly fit in Lux's front door or on the balcony either."

"I…does anyone know what happened to you?"

"No," he admitted, and he hung his head. It was different-how could it not be-but even by now she was beginning to read the tells into his emotions via his new form. "This was the only space I thought I could hide more or less. I suppose Father expected I'd return to Hell like this, but I refuse to cede that to him either. I love Earth, not bloody leaving it now."

"But Maze or Amenadiel…they could help, right?" She blinked. "Shit. I just realized that Maze really is a demon, and unless you've both been pulling my leg this whole time then Amenadiel's an angel."

"Archangel, technically," Lucifer answered. "I should talk to them. It's just rather embarrassing, and I'm sure Maze would never let me live this down…assuming I can make it better. Maybe I should have called Linda, but this is a lot more than a shrink has ever handled, and I was trying to give her a rest after everything with Mum flash frying her."

"What? Linda knows and she got hurt by your Mother? Wait…God has a wife?"

"Had a wife, they're most assuredly exes, but no worries, I gave Mum her own universe so you won't bump into her ever again, detective."

"I…" she blinked at him. Then, blinked again. Somehow, she assumed that actually having proof Lucifer was the devil (and a dragon apparently) would make the rest of his life make sense. That was clearly the wrong assumption. With her partner-almost boyfriend?-there was nothing but prologue about him. "Okay, let's just…wow."

His great brows knitted together in probable concern. "Oh, no. I've done it again. This was why I tried to hide, Chloe." His voice was soft and mournful when he uttered her name. "Linda went a bit catatonic, and that was just from seeing my true face. I can't imagine that a whole dragon before you is doing much for your sanity."

She shook her head and reaching out, stroked his cheek. It was soft and dry beneath her touch but not completely unpleasant. It wouldn't make him feel better, but his skin, as it was now, reminded her of an old pair of snake skin boots her mother had. A pair Chloe had always stolen out of her mother's closet as a kid to play with.

"I'm fine…I think." 

"Not reassuring."

"But, I'm going to need a lot of flow charts or _Cliff's Notes_ to understand what I've already missed in your life. So, look, I think the only way to help fix your problem is to talk to anyone else who's also, well, you know special."

"I don't ride a special bus to school, detective. I'm the devil. It's a tad different."

She shook her head and, for the first time that night, no matter how weird things were, Chloe knew they'd be okay. Because arguing with Lucifer was normal. It was what she did. If she could roll her eyes at him, as she was now, and he could be snippy and sarcastic-and boy was he-then they'd be fine.

"Fine, magical, mystical friends, oh great Satan."

"Still prefer Lucifer or Old Scratch. You humans never use that one enough."

"Great, okay _Lucifer_," she said, slipping easily into her regular rhythm with him. Chloe could rein him in. It was practically _all_ she did. "Then, obviously, the next step is to speak with Amenadiel, see what he knows since he's the one who can actually go to heaven right?"

"Yes, had my express pass revoked. Permanently." The bitterness was thick in his voice and she spread her arms wide and hugged his neck. It reminded her vaguely of riding a horse as a child. He was so much bigger but the motion of reaching her arms around his neck was still familiar.

Lucifer stiffened under her embrace. "Chloe, really, you don't have to."

"Just shut up, Lucifer."

"What?"

She squeezed harder. "I missed you, and I'm actually super glad you didn't run off to Vegas again." He relaxed in her grip and, eventually, she was rewarded with a low, contented rumble that reverberated through his chest. Chloe smirked and winked at him. "Are you, Lucifer Morningstar, fancy British man (she sucked at the accent but her attempt rewarded her with more of him chuffing at her so it was worth it), and actual Lord of Hell, purring?"

He straightened his head, and she'd seen him sit up in his seat at the precinct with that same implied indignation. "I did no such thing. I'm a dragon. We roar."

"Or you purr like an overgrown kitten," she replied, kissing his cheek,

Lucifer blinked back at her but said nothing for the longest time, which, to be honest, was the strangest thing she'd ever seen. Her partner was many things, dragon now among them, but he was _never_ quiet.

"Oh, did I break your brain now?" She replied, her tone playfully echoing back his fears from earlier in the evening.

"No, Chloe…I just…what ever did I do to deserve you?"

"Not sure yet, but you came back, even like this and I know we met up by accident, but maybe not really. Because this beach and that kiss were the best parts of my life. It makes sense you'd come here too." 

He nodded regally and then stepped away from the caves. She scooted back to make room for him. There was so much of him now that it blew her mind, and she bet for sure that whoever in Revelation's visions of Lucifer's tail sweeping away the stars was far from impossible.

"Are you…you're alright, aren't you?" Lucifer asked, as courtly and concerned as ever, despite the rumbling growl laced through his voice now.

She nodded. "Maybe. I did drive out here but if we're going to wherever Amenadiel lives-"

Lucifer chuffed. "There are apartments between Lux and my penthouse. My erstwhile brother has a floor for himself. He has yet to master the regular, human job yet. But I won't fit there, no." His eyes grew wide. "But I've an idea. Do you have your mobile?"

Chloe pulled her cell from her pocket. "Always, what do you want me to do."

Lucifer held up a large talon. "Can hardly reach out and ring someone, can I? Call my brother and ask him to meet us at the Hollywood sign. We can figure this sordid mess out together there." Then, he bowed his head-his whole neck low-and gazed at her with those beautiful, glowing eyes. "Fancy a ride, detective. I bet I'm far faster than your sedan."

She hesitated for a second and Lucifer's mood changed faster than a lightening strike. He sat up fully again and his wings drooped behind him.

"Right then, forget I asked. Too much to hope for, I suppose."

_Oh for the love of his, well, Dad. Lucifer Morningstar and his mood swings would be the death of her. Or, really, should at least earn her hazard pay._

"No, it's not you…" she grimaced at how that sounded. "I mean, I'm afraid of heights. I'd love to because, honestly, it's pretty damn cool, Lucifer."

He preened at that and spread his wings out far beside him. "Why thank you."

"But I really don't want to fall, and if I go splat, who will take care of Trixie?"

Lucifer brought one talon to his chest, clearly affronted. "Detective…Chloe, I would never let harm come to you. You've nothing to fear from me, and I give you my word of honor that I would never let you fall. You know that I am a devil of my word, don't you?"

She nodded. "Okay, but I'm really…it's pretty high."

He lowered his neck, and she bit back her own instinctive fear of heights as she settled himself on the space where his long, elegant neck met his shoulder blades. "I will always keep you safe. Don't ever doubt that."

She nodded and gipped tightly to the spikes there. "I don't, but if I end up a pancake, you are the officially the worst boyfriend ever."

He stilled underneath her. "I beg your pardon. I must have misheard you."

Chloe shook her head and patted his back as best she could, not sure how much of that he could feel through his scales. "You didn't, and you know you didn't."

"Yes, but, detective, perhaps it would be best if we waited to have this particular discussion until after the shock of my newest hiccup has worn off. I don't wish for you to do anything you'd regret."

She leaned down and brushed her lips against his neck. "No, I'll be sure of this in the morning or in a week. I promised we'd figure out what we are to each other once you told me the truth. You kept up your end of the deal, and, you might not know this, but Chloe Decker is a woman of her word too." She braced herself against him as he beat his mighty wings and took off into the night, her heart filled with possibility for the first time since he'd fled to Vegas.

And now with nothing hidden between them.


End file.
